Chapter 21 Integrating Research Paraphrasing and Quoting

What Is Paraphrasing?

In Chapter 2: Improve Your Reading Comprehension, you practiced identifying main and supporting ideas, which is a necessary first step in understanding and then paraphrasing the information you find in your research. You might want to review that section before you move on to the task of paraphrasing.

Paraphrasing is expressing information from research sources in your own words using your own sentence structures. It is an important skill to develop because when you paraphrase, you not only show you understand what you have read, but you also demonstrate your ability to process and adapt that information to your writing purpose.

In most situations, a research essay should contain much more paraphrased material than quoted material. Occasional quotations can certainly be useful and impactful, but in order to show you understand what you have read, you should paraphrase more often than you quote in essays.

When you paraphrase, you must include a citation that acknowledges the original source of the ideas. Although the words are yours, the ideas belong to the original author(s), and you must give that person credit for the ideas. We will come back to this point later in this chapter, but for now, let’s focus on how to paraphrase effectively.

How to Paraphrase Effectively

When you paraphrase material from a source, you restate the information in your own words, using your own sentence structure.

Paraphrasing differs from summarizing (which we discussed in detail in Chapter 15: Summary) because in paraphrasing, you focus on restating the ideas, not necessarily condensing them like you would in a summary. Having said that, as you integrate research into your essays, you may find it useful to combine the techniques of paraphrasing and summarizing, expressing information in your own words and making it more concise than it was in the research source.

Students sometimes use the “thesaurus method” of paraphrasing: that is, they simply rewrite a sentence from the source material, switching out most of the nouns, verbs, and adjectives with synonyms but retaining the essential grammatical structure of the sentence. However, this approach is not effective, and it often leads a student into accidental plagiarism.

To paraphrase effectively—and avoid plagiarizing—use your own words, grammar, and style to convey the ideas from the research source. At times, you may have to rewrite a sentence more than once to make sure you are paraphrasing the idea effectively.

Below is an example of a student’s paraphrasing process. Mia is writing an essay about the evolution of literature written by Albertans. She goes through several steps to paraphrase the information and express it effectively in her own words using her own sentence structure.

First, read the excerpt from the source material, from the anthology Wild Words: Essays on Alberta Literature by Donna Coates and George Melnyk:

Mia wants to include these ideas in her essay, and she begins with an initial attempt at paraphrasing the excerpt from the book. As you read, notice that it reads like a summary. Mia has paraphrased one or two lines at a time and presented the ideas in the same order that Coates and Melnyk did:

First Attempt at Paraphrasing

According to Donna Coates and George Melnyk, the notion that any Canadian province, outside Quebec, might have a unique literary identity is new and moot. It was the same eighty years ago when the notion that Canada had a unique literary identity was new and controversial. However, by the 1970s, people readily accepted that Canadian literature was distinct. At the same time, people also accepted the idea of Prairie literature being distinct. The Prairie literature idea arose from a time in Canadian history when Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba were all agricultural and culturally similar. However, after World War II, Alberta became the fulcrum of Canada’s energy industry. Urbanization, industrialization, and new wealth made Alberta different from Manitoba and Saskatchewan. With a resounding energy industry and population, Alberta changed into an inconsistent kind of establishment. After 1980, because Alberta was no longer like the other Prairie areas, the term Prairie no longer was understandable.

In Mia’s first attempt, she has conveyed Coates and Melnyk’s ideas, one after the other, without applying any of her own critical thinking skills to what she’s read. This is problematic, as you’ll learn in Chapter 22 in the section on “fair dealing” as it applies to the use of research sources.

Also, notice that in this first draft, Mia uses wording that is too similar to the source material. Let’s look at two sections placed next to each other:

Look closely at the two sections above, and notice similarities and differences. What looks most problematic to you?

It might surprise you to know that the fact that Mia used the words Canada and Quebec, which appear in the original, is not the problem. These words are essential for conveying the authors’ ideas.

However, notice that Mia has swapped the following nonessential words:

• idea → notion
• province → area
• other than → outside

As we have mentioned, this is often referred to as the thesaurus method of paraphrasing. Despite the swaps, the grammar is identical to the original. Look at how the grammar compares:

The sentence structure is identical. Let’s look at another section:

Again, the primary problem is not that Mia copied the words Canada and literary identity, which are essential to conveying the main ideas. Part of the problem is the way Mia has swapped out nonessential words:

• idea → notion
• distinct → unique
• novel → new
• debatable → controversial

Despite swapping out these words with synonyms, Mia has copied the sentence structure from the source:

Again, Mia’s grammar is identical to the original. Because she has copied the sentence structure, Mia is plagiarizing! The thesaurus method is not an effective way to paraphrase. Carefully read Mia’s first draft again. Can you find other examples of grammatical plagiarism?

Also, because Mia was using the thesaurus method, she used an online dictionary to find synonyms for some of Coates and Melnyk’s words. As a result, she used some words she was not familiar with and didn’t carefully consider some subtle but important differences in meaning between the synonyms. Look at this list of words Mia chose to replace words in the original source. Do the synonyms have exactly the same meaning? Or do they have different connotations?

• debatable → moot
• distinct → unique
• centre → fulcrum
• booming → resounding
• different → inconsistent
• province → establishment
• province → area

Because some of these so-called synonyms significantly change the intended meaning, Mia is misrepresenting Coates and Melnyk’s ideas, which is another type of academic misconduct. To resist the temptation to copy Coates and Melnyk’s grammar, Mia closes the book—and sets aside her first attempt at paraphrasing—so that she can’t see it as she writes the next draft.

Mia makes another attempt at paraphrasing and comes up with a single sentence that not only concisely paraphrases but also accurately represents the main ideas of the source material:

Revised Paraphrasing

According to Donna Coates and George Melnyk, up until the mid-1900s, people didn’t think that Alberta had its own literary identity (viii). Because of its agricultural history, Alberta was grouped with Manitoba and Saskatchewan, and the genre of Prairie literature developed (viii). However, as the hub of Canada’s energy industry, Alberta hasn’t been similar to Manitoba and Saskatchewan in almost a century (ix). Now a wealthy urban province, Alberta has a distinct culture that is reflected in its literature (Coates and Melnyk ix).

Mia has now successfully paraphrased the information by using her own wording, creating her own sentence structure, and condensing the information. These paraphrased sentences demonstrate that Mia has truly understood the ideas—not merely parroted them.

Notice that Mia has included some of the same terms from the original source, including Alberta, literary identity, agricultural, Prairie literature, energy industry, wealthy, distinct, and culture. This is acceptable—and even required—because these keywords are essential to conveying the meaning of the source material. Without these words, the student could not effectively or accurately convey the meaning: if Mia were to use the thesaurus method to swap these nouns and adjectives with synonyms, she would likely misrepresent Coates and Melnyk’s ideas. Thus, this is not plagiarism because Mia has changed other nonessential words and used her own sentence structure.

After writing the final draft, there are three more essential steps in paraphrasing: First, read the source material one more time and double-check that your paraphrasing accurately conveys the author’s ideas. Also, double-check that you have used your own sentence structure. Finally, add citations that acknowledge the source of the ideas, as Mia has by including Coates and Melnyk’s names in the first sentence and by including the page numbers in parenthetical citations.

What Are Quotations?

Most of the time, you will summarize or paraphrase information instead of quoting directly from the source. Paraphrasing shows that you understand the information from research well enough to write about it confidently in your own words. With that said, direct quotations can be powerful when used sparingly and with purpose. You might decide, after much critical thought, that you have found an amazing, well-suited quotation that cannot be paraphrased, and you want to incorporate that quotation into your paper.

A quotation consists of words and phrases copied word for word from the source and placed in your essay. The copied words must be enclosed in quotation marks to indicate that they are someone else’s words—not your own. When quoting, maintain the same wording, spelling, capitalization, and punctuation. To avoid accidentally plagiarizing, attribute the quoted words to the source by adding citations, which you’ll learn more about in Chapter 22.

There are different ways to integrate a quotation into your essay depending on how long the quotation is; there are also a number of formatting requirements.

When to Quote

Quoting directly can sometimes help you make a point in a colourful way. If an author’s words are especially vivid, memorable, or well phrased, quoting them may help hold your reader’s interest. Direct quotations from an interviewee or an eyewitness may help you personalize an issue for readers. Also, when you analyze primary sources, such as a historical speech or a work of literature, quoting extensively is often necessary to illustrate your points. These are valid reasons to use quotations.

When deciding to include quotation instead of paraphrasing, make sure the quotation is a statement that the original author has worded so beautifully that it would be less effective if you changed it into your own words.

Less experienced writers sometimes overuse direct quotations in research papers because it seems easier than paraphrasing. A paper that consists of mostly quotations pieced together does not demonstrate original thought but rather indicates that you are good at cutting and pasting. At best, this reduces the effectiveness of the quotations. At worst, it results in a paper that seems haphazardly pasted together from outside sources.

What you write in essays should be primarily your own words; your instructors want to know what your ideas are and for you to demonstrate your own critical thinking. Therefore, strive to state your ideas, develop them thoroughly, and then insert supporting quotations from experts only when necessary to support your ideas. Use quotations sparingly for greater impact.

Guidelines for Quoting

When you choose to quote directly from a source, follow these guidelines:

• • Only use a quotation when the original writer has phrased a statement so perfectly that you could not rephrase it any better without getting away from the writer’s point.
• • Represent the author’s ideas honestly and accurately. Never use a quotation out of context in a way that suggests a different meaning.
• • Make sure you have transcribed the original statement accurately.
• • Quote only as much of the text as needed.
• • Never use a stand-alone quotation—also called a “dropped” or “floating” quotation. Instead, integrate quoted material into your own sentence.
• • Use an attributive tag to lead into the quotation, and provide a citation.
• • Indicate a quotation by enclosing it in double quotation marks.
• • To represent a quotation within a quotation, use single quotation marks.
• • Use ellipses and/or square brackets to indicate an alteration to a quotation.
• • Include a correctly formatted citation that indicates whose words you are quoting.

We will examine each of these guidelines in more detail in this chapter.

Short Quotations

When you find a quotation you would like to include verbatim (word for word) from a source, decide if you should include the whole paragraph or section or a smaller part. Generally, it is better to choose shorter quotations rather than longer ones.

A short quotation can be one word, a phrase, or a complete sentence. Generally, a short quotation is one that is fewer than forty words or four lines of text.

You might want to include a quoted sentence as a whole. If so, you can use an attributive tag to incorporate a quotation fluidly into your sentence:

• According to Marshall, “Before the creation of organized governmental policing agencies, it was citizens possessing firearms who monitored and maintained the peace” (712).

In the example above, the attributive tag is underlined. The attributive tag acknowledges the source of the quotation, giving Marshall credit for his words and ideas. The tag also integrates the quotation smoothly into the paragraph. Because the attributive tag includes the author’s name, it’s not necessary to repeat the author’s name in the parenthetical citation at the end of the sentence, and the parenthetical citation includes only the page number. Here is another example of an attributive tag:

• Chang asserts, “Engaging in weight-bearing exercise is one of the single best things women can do to maintain good health” (49).

Note the use of the strong verb asserts to introduce the direct quotation. Avoid using the same attributive tags over and over again; refer to Table 21.1 for some examples.

Alternatively, you might want to break the quotation in two and place the author’s name between the two parts:

“Engaging in weight-bearing exercise,” Chang asserts, “is one of the single best things women can do to maintain good health” (49).

It is often more effective to break up the original sentence and choose to quote only the part that is most well written and/or most relevant to the point you are making in your essay. Paraphrase the rest:

According to Annie Chang’s research, weight-bearing exercise is “one of single best things” for women’s wellness (49).

Including the title of a source is optional. If you think that including the title will enhance the credibility of the ideas, you might want to include it the first time you refer to the source.

In Weight Training for Women, Chang asserts, “Engaging in weight-bearing exercise is one of the single best things women can do to maintain good health” (49).

If you do not use an attributive tag because the quotation already fits smoothly into your sentence, the quotation can be integrated directly into your sentence:

Vigilantism in the Wild West was committed by “citizens possessing firearms who monitored and maintained the peace” (Marshall 712).

Notice that because there is no attributive tag in the sentences to introduce the name of the source, you must acknowledge the source of the quotation by adding a parenthetical citation that includes the author’s name and the page number in parentheses at the end of the sentence.

Avoid redundancy. If you name the author(s) in the sentence, do not repeat the name(s) in your parenthetical citation.

Unnecessary repetition:

Chang emphasizes that “engaging in weight-bearing exercise consistently is one of the single best things women can do to maintain good health” (Chang 49).

A quotation that is not integrated into one of the sentences of your essay is called a dropped quotation or a floating quotation. As you revise your essay, look for any quotation that takes up an entire sentence on its own. Here is an example of a dropped quotation in a student’s paragraph:

After my father died, I went through all the classic stages of grief. “Bargaining comes from a feeling of helplessness and gives us a perceived sense of control over something that feels so out of control” (Clarke). All I wanted was to get my father back again.

Notice how the quotation interrupts the flow of the student’s narrative about her father’s death. It appears to be dropped out of the blue into the essay, and the student hasn’t made clear the connection between the quotation and her experience. Therefore, the dropped quotation is jarring for the reader, and it interferes with the coherence of the paragraph. This is why it’s important to always integrate quotations.

Long (Block) Quotations

The definition of a “long” quotation varies according to which documentation style you’re using:

• • In APA style, a long quotation is more than forty words long.
• • In Chicago style, a long quotation is one hundred words or more.
• • In MLA style, a long quotation is four or more lines long.

Long quotations should be used even more sparingly than shorter ones. In the majority of your essays, you likely won’t need to include any long quotations at all.

A long quotation should never be as long as a page. There are two reasons for this: First, by including a long quotation, you are essentially letting another author do all the thinking and/or writing for you. Remember that your audience wants to read your ideas, not someone else’s.

Second, unless all the information and every word in the long quotation is essential and could not be paraphrased (which is unlikely with a long passage), you are not showing your audience you have processed or evaluated the importance of the source’s critical information and weeded out the unnecessary information.

If you believe you have found the perfect paragraph to support your ideas, and you decide you really want or need to use the long quotation, see if you can shorten it by removing unnecessary words or complete sentences and putting ellipses in their place. (See Altering Quoted Material later in this chapter.) This will show your reader that you have put a lot of thought into the use of the quotation.

How to Alter Quotations

Whether you quote a complete sentence or only part of one, make sure it blends in smoothly with your own sentence or paragraph. Sometimes, that requires making a change to a quotation. For example, if your paragraph is written in the present tense but the quotation is in the past tense, you might need to change the verb tense in the quotation so it will fit into your sentence.

Make sure any omissions or changed words do not alter the meaning of the original text. Omit or replace words only when absolutely necessary to shorten the text or to make it grammatically correct within your sentence, and always indicate that you have made a change to the quotation.