Plagiarism- from http://www

INFORMATION TO ASSIST WITH YOUR GLOBAL STUDIES 10 RESEARCH PAPER- PLEASE READ!

Many thanks to Mr. Wilkes, Dr. Ericson, and the organizations represented in this packet…

FROM THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA WRITING CENTERfrom http://www.unc.edu/depts/wcweb/handouts/Procrastination

The art of writing is the art of applying the seat of the pants to the seat of the chair. -Mary Heaton Vorse

What this handout is about...

This handout will help you understand why you procrastinate and offer strategies and to combat this common writer's ailment.

Introduction Everyone procrastinates. We put things off because we don't want to do them, or because we have too many other things on our plates. Putting things off-big or small-is part of being human. If you are reading this handout, however, it is likely that your procrastination is troubling you. You suspect that you could be a much better writer if only you didn't put off writing projects until the last minute. You find that just when you have really gotten going on a paper, it's time to turn it in; so, you never really have time to revise or proofread carefully. You love the rush of adrenalin you get when you finish a paper ten minutes before it's due, but you (and your body) are getting tired of pulling all-nighters. You feel okay about procrastinating while in college, but you worry that this habit will follow you into your working life.

You can tell whether or not you need to do something about your procrastination by examining its consequences. Procrastination can have external consequences (you get a zero on the paper because you never turned it in) or internal consequences (you feel anxious much of the time, even when you are doing something that you enjoy). If you put off washing the dishes, but the dishes don't bother you, who cares? When your procrastination leaves you feeling discouraged and overburdened, however, it is time to take action.

Is There Hope? If you think you are a hopeless procrastinator, take heart! No one is beyond help. The fact that you procrastinate does not mean that you are inherently lazy or inefficient. Your procrastination is not an untamable beast. It is a habit that has some specific origin, and it is a habit that you can overcome. This handout will help you begin to understand why you procrastinate and give you some strategies for turning things around. For most procrastinators, however, there are no quick fixes. You aren't going to wake up tomorrow and never procrastinate again. But you might wake up tomorrow and do one or two simple things that will help you finish that draft a little earlier or with less stress.

You may not be surprised to learn that procrastinators tend to be self-critical. So, as you consider your procrastination and struggle to develop different work habits, try to be gentle with yourself. Punishing yourself every time you realize you have put something off won't help you change. Rewarding yourself when you make progress will.

If you don't care why you procrastinate-you just want to know what to do about it-then you might as well skip the next section of this handout and go right to the section labeled "What to do about it." If you skip to the strategies, however, you may only end up more frustrated. Taking the time to learn about why you procrastinate may help you avoid the cycle whereby you swear up and down that you will never procrastinate again, only to find that the next time you have a paper due, you are up until 3 a.m. trying to complete the first (and only) draft-without knowing why or how you got there.

Why we do it

In order to stop putting off your writing assignments, it is important to understand why you tend to do so in the first place. Some of the reasons that people procrastinate include the following:

Because we are afraid.

· Fear of failure: If you are scared that a particular piece of writing isn't going to turn out well, then you may avoid working on it in order to avoid feeling the fear.

· Fear of success: Some procrastinators (the author of this handout included) fear that if they start working at their full capacity, they will turn into workaholics. Since we procrastinate compulsively, we assume that we will also write compulsively; we envision ourselves locked in a library carrel, hunched over the computer, barely eating and sleeping and never seeing friends or going out. The procrastinator who fears success may also assume that if they work too hard, they will become mean and cold to the people around them, thus losing their capacity to be friendly and to have fun. Finally, this type of procrastinator may think that if they stop procrastinating, then they will start writing better, which will increase other people's expectations, thus ultimately increasing the amount of pressure they experience.

· Fear of losing autonomy: Some people delay writing projects as a way of maintaining their independence. When they receive a writing assignment, they procrastinate as a way of saying, "You can't make me do this. I am my own person." Procrastinating helps them feel more in control of situations (such as college) in which they believe that other people have authority.

· Fear of being alone: Other writers procrastinate because they want to feel constantly connected to other people. For instance, you may procrastinate until you are in such a bind that someone has to come and rescue you. Procrastination therefore ensures that other people will be involved in your life. You may also put off writing because you don't want to be alone, and writing is oftentimes a solitary activity. In its worst form, procrastination itself can become a companion, constantly reminding you of all that you have to do.

· Fear of attachment: Rather than fearing separation, some people procrastinate in order to create a barrier between themselves and others. They may delay in order to create chaos in their lives, believing that the chaos will keep other people away.

Whether these fears appear in our conscious or subconscious minds, they paralyze us and keep us from taking action, until discomfort and anxiety overwhelms us and forces us to either a) get the piece of writing done or b) give up. (The preceding is a summary of Chapters 2-4 of Jane B. Burka and Lenora M. Yuen's Procrastination: Why You Do It, What to Do About It. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, 1983.)

Because we expect ourselves to be perfect.

Procrastination and perfectionism often go hand in hand. Perfectionists tend to procrastinate because they expect so much of themselves, and they are scared about whether or not they can meet those high standards. Perfectionists sometimes think that it is better to give a half-hearted effort and maintain the belief that they could have written a great paper, than to give a full effort and risk writing a mediocre paper. Procrastinating guarantees failure, but it helps perfectionists maintain their belief that they could have excelled if they had tried harder. Another pitfall for perfectionists is that they tend to ignore progress toward a goal. As long as the writing project is incomplete, they feel as though they aren't getting anywhere, rather than recognizing that each paragraph moves them closer to a finished product.

Because we don't like our writing.

You may procrastinate on writing because you don't like to re-read what you have written; you hate writing a first draft and then being forced to evaluate it, in all its imperfection. By procrastinating, you ensure that you don't have time to read over your work, thus avoiding that uncomfortable moment.

Because we're too busy.

Practical concerns: jobs, other classes, etc.

Because it works.

Unfortunately, procrastination helps reinforce itself. When we avoid doing something we dread (like writing) by doing something we enjoy (such as watching TV, hanging out with friends, etc.), we escape the dreaded task. Given such a choice, it's no wonder that many of us choose to procrastinate. When we write a paper at the last minute and still manage to get a good grade, we feel all the more compelled to procrastinate next time around.

What to do about it

Now that you know a little bit about why you may have procrastinated in the past, let's explore some of the strategies you might use to combat your procrastination tendencies, now and in the future. Experiment with whichever of these strategies appeals to you; if you try something and it doesn't work, try something else! Be patient; improvement will come with practice.

Take an inventory.

Figuring out exactly when and how you procrastinate can help you stop the behavior. It can be difficult to tell when you are procrastinating. Think about the clues that tell you that's what you're doing: for example, a nagging voice in your head, a visual image of what you are avoiding or the consequences of not doing it, physical ailments (stomach tightness, headaches, muscle tension), inability to concentrate, inability to enjoy what you are doing.

How do you procrastinate?

· Try to ignore the task, hoping against hope that it will go away?

· Over- or under- estimate the degree of difficulty that the task involves?

· Minimize the impact that your performance now may have on your future?

· Substitute something important for something really important? (For example, cleaning instead of writing your paper.)

· Let a short break become a long one, or an evening in which you do no work at all? (For example, claiming that you are going to watch TV for ½ hour, then watching it all night.)

· Focus on one part of the task, at the expense of the rest? (For example, keep working on the introduction, while putting off writing the body and conclusion).

· Spend too much time researching or choosing a topic

Once you better understand how you procrastinate, you will be better able to catch yourself doing it. Too often, we don't even realize that we are procrastinating-until it's too late.

Create a productive environment.

If you have made the decision to stop delaying on a particular writing project, it is critical that you find a place to work where you have at least half a chance of actually getting some writing done. Your dorm room may not be the place where you are most productive. Ditto the computer lab. If you have a laptop computer, try going someplace where you can't connect to the Internet (e-mail and the World Wide Web are the bane of the procrastinator's existence-as you probably already know). If you are a procrastinator, then chances are you are already pretty exasperated; don't risk frustrating yourself even more by trying to write in an environment that doesn't meet your needs.

[CAUTION: The most skilled procrastinators will be tempted to take this suggestion too far, spending an inordinate amount of time "creating a productive environment" (cleaning, filing, etc.) and not nearly enough time actually writing. Don't fall into that trap! While cleaning and filing are indeed worthy and necessary activities, if you only do this when you have an approaching writing deadline, then you are procrastinating.]While you are thinking about where to write, consider also when you will write. When are you most alert? Is it at 8 a.m., mid-morning, mid-afternoon, early evening, or late at night? Try to schedule writing time when you know you will be at your best. Don't worry about when you "should" be able to write; just focus on when you are able to write.

Challenge your myths.

In order to break the procrastination habit, we need to get past the idea that in order to write, we must have all the information pertaining to the topic, and we must have optimal writing conditions. In reality, writers never have all the information, and conditions are never optimal.

Think of a writing project that you are currently putting off. On one side of a piece of paper, write down all the reasons for your delay. On the other side, argue (as convincingly as possible!) against the delay.

Myth #1: "I can't function in a messy environment. I can't possibly write this paper until I have cleaned my apartment."

Challenge: There are no conditions that are necessary in order for you to write, save two: 1) You must have a writing implement (e.g., a keyboard or a pen) and 2) you must have someplace for writing to go, such as into a computer or onto a piece of paper. If, when faced with a writing project, you start piling up prerequisites for all the things you must do before you can possibly start writing, consider whether you might in fact be making excuses-in other words, procrastinating.

Myth #2: "I know it's time for me to start writing, but I just haven't done enough research yet. I'll spend one more night at the library, and then I'll start writing my paper."

Challenge: Truth be told, you will never collect all the information you possibly could for your paper. Better to write a tightly-crafted argument with the information you have NOW, AT THIS VERY MOMENT, than to keep doing research and risk throwing your paper together at the last minute.

Myth #3: "I do my best work under pressure."

Challenge: There are lots of other ways to create pressure for yourself, besides waiting until the night before the paper is due to start writing it. You can set a time limit for yourself-- for example, "I will write this paragraph in ½ hour"-- or you can pretend that the paper is a timed essay exam. If you do this a week or two before the paper is due, you'll have a draft in plenty of time to revise and edit it.

Myth #4: "In order to work on my paper, I must have six uninterrupted hours."

Challenge: You can and should work on a paper in one hour blocks (or shorter). This will help you break the writing task down into smaller pieces, thereby making it seem more manageable. If you know that you can work on one part of the paper for one hour, then it won't seem so daunting, and you will be less likely to procrastinate.

Some writers find, however, that they do need longer blocks of time in order to really produce anything. Therefore, like all of the strategies outlined here, if this one doesn't work for you, throw it out and try something else. You might still find, however, that you are more productive when you plan to write "all morning" rather than "all day."

Myth #5: "What I write has to be perfect, " AND/OR "I can't write anything until I have a perfect thesis statement/intro."

Challenge: A first draft (or a second, or a third, or even-egad!-the final product) does not have to be perfect. When we write an early draft, we need to turn off our internal critic and just get some words down on the page. The great thing about starting early on a writing project is that it leaves us plenty of time for revision, editing, and proofreading; so, we can set ourselves free to just let our writing flow, without worrying about sentence-level concerns such as grammar, punctuation, and style. You'll find some other thoughts on editing in our handouts on proofreading and revision.

Break it down.

The day you get the paper assignment (ideally), or shortly thereafter, break the writing assignment up into the smallest possible chunks. By doing this, the paper never has a chance to take on gargantuan proportions in your mind. You can say to yourself, "Right now, I'm going to write the introduction. That's all, just the introduction!" And you may be more likely to sit down and do that, than you will to sit down and "write the paper."

Get a new attitude.

We shoot ourselves in the foot, to begin with, by telling ourselves how horrible a particular writing assignment is. Changing our attitude toward the task, when possible, may go a long way toward keeping us from procrastinating. Tell yourself that the task isn't so bad or difficult, that you either know how to do it, or that you can learn how while you're doing it. You may find, too, that if you start early on a particular assignment, your attitude never has a chance to get very negative in the first place! Simply starting to write can often help us feel more positive about writing.

Ask for help.

· Get an anti-procrastination coach. If you are really determined not to procrastinate, then get help from the supportive people in your life. Tell someone about your writing goal and timeline, and ask them to help you determine whether or not your plan is realistic. Once or twice a week, email with a friend, relative, or mentor, in order to report (admit?) on your progress, and declare your promise for the next week (or few days). If, despite your very good intentions, you start procrastinating again, do not think, "Oops, I Did It Again; all is lost." Instead, talk to someone about it. They may be able to help you put your slip into perspective and get back on track.

· Get a buddy. See if you can find a friend to work alongside you. They don't have to be writing a paper; in fact, they can be playing Solitaire, for all you care. What matters is that you arrange to meet them at the library (or wherever you have decided to write) at a particular time and stay there for a specific period of time, thus creating accountability.

· Get help with your writing. If you are procrastinating because you think you are a weak writer, then ask someone (a Writing Center tutor, a current or former professor or teaching assistant, a friend) to help you improve.

· Form a writing group. A writing group is a great way for undergraduate and more advanced writers alike to create accountability, get feedback, and simply get reminded that you are not alone in the struggle to produce and to improve your writing. See our writing group packet at for more information on how to form and sustain a writing group. Dissertation writers may benefit not only from joining a writing group but also from reading our handout on the dissertation. This handout was written by a former Writing Center staff member who eventually completed her dissertation.

Get unblocked.

Sometimes, we procrastinate because we feel stuck on a particular essay or section of an essay. If this happens, you have several options:

· Turn off the screen. Type with a dark screen, so you can't see what you've written, decide you don't like it, and delete it immediately. Sometimes procrastination stems from insecurity about what to say, or whether we have anything to say. The important thing, in that case, is to get started and KEEP GOING. Turning off the screen may help lessen your fear and turn off your internal critic. When you turn it back on (or print out what you've written), you may find that you do have something to say, after all.

· Write about writing. Take 15 minutes and write a letter to yourself about why you don't want to write this. This lets you vent your frustrations and anxieties. Then, Take 15 minutes and write about what you could do to get unstuck. You can also try writing about what you're going to write, making an initial assessment of the assignment. You won't have the pressure of writing an actually draft, but you will be able to get something down on paper.

· Write the easiest part first. You don't have to start at the beginning. Whatever section you can do, do it! If you think that's wimpy, and you would rather do the hardest part first so that you can get it out of the way, that's fine-whatever works for you. If you start writing and you get stuck, write about why you're stuck.

· Talk it out. Try tape-recording yourself speaking the ideas you want to include in the paper, and then transcribe the tape.

Make yourself accountable.

Set a writing deadline (other than the paper's due date) for yourself by making an appointment at the Writing Center or telling your TA (or a former TA) that you're going to give them a draft on such-and-such a date. If you make your Writing Center appointment for several days before the paper is due, then you may be motivated to have a draft finished, in order to make the appointment worthwhile.

Leave your work out.

Keeping your work (books, notes, articles, etc.) physically out, in full view, gives you a reminder that you are in the middle of the paper, or that you need to start. Also, if you write in more than one shift, it can be helpful to leave off in the middle of a paragraph and leave your 'tools' where they are. When you return to the paper, you'll be able to "warm up" by finishing that paragraph. Starting a new section cold may be more difficult.

Work on improving your writing when you don't have a deadline.

Investigate your writing process. First of all, you may not think you have a thing called a "writing process." But you do-everyone does. Describe your writing process in detail.

Ask Yourself:

· When do I usually start on a paper?

· What tools do I need (or think I need) in order to write?

· Where do I write?

· Do I like quiet or noise when I write?

· How long a block of time do I need?

· What do I do before I start?

· What do I do at the end?

· How do I feel at the end (after I have turned it in)?

Then ask yourself:

· What do I like about my writing process?

· What do I want to change?

Once you can see your writing process, then you can make a decision to change it. But take it easy with this-only work on one part at a time. Otherwise, you'll get overwhelmed and frustrated-and we all know where that leads, straight down the procrastination road.

Evaluate your writing's strengths and weaknesses.

If you aren't ready to evaluate your writing process completely (and it's okay if you aren't), then you could try just listing your strengths and weaknesses as a writer. For instance, perhaps you are great at creating thesis statements, but you have trouble developing arguments. Or, your papers are very well-organized, but your thesis and argument tend to fall a little flat. Identifying these issues will help you do two things: 1) When you write, you can play to your strength; and 2) You can choose one weakness and do something about it when you DON'T have a deadline.

Now, doing anything when you don't have a deadline may sound strange to a procrastinator, but bear with me. Let's say you've decided that your writing is too wordy, and you want to work on being more concise. So, some time when you don't have a paper-but you do have a free hour-you waltz into the Writing Center and tell your tutor, "Hey, I want learn how to write more clearly." You confer, and you come away with some simple strategies for eliminating wordiness.

Here is why this may make a difference the next time you write a paper, regardless or whether or not you have procrastinated (again!): You print out your draft. It's 1 a.m. You go to bed. The next morning, you read over your paper (it's due at noon). You say to yourself, "Hmmm, I notice I'm being too wordy." BUT, rather than concluding, "Oh, well, it's too late, there isn't anything I can do about that," (as you may have in the past), you can choose to employ some of what you learned (previously, when you weren't under the gun) to make your writing more concise. You edit the paper accordingly. You turn it in.

When your instructor hands the papers back the following week, there are far fewer instances of "awkward," "unclear," etc. in the margins. Voila! You've made a positive change in your writing process!

What does this have to do with procrastination? Well, making one small change in your writing process creates momentum. You begin to feel more positive about your writing. You begin to be less intimidated by writing assignments. And-eventually-you start them earlier, because they just aren't as big a deal as they used to be.

Evaluating the strengths and weaknesses in your writing gives you a sense of control. Your writing problems are solvable problems. Working on your writing when you don't have a deadline helps you gain insight and momentum. Soon, writing becomes something that, while you may not look forward to it, you don't dread quite as much. Thus, you don't procrastinate quite as much.

This strategy also accounts for the fact that if you perceive procrastination as having been successful for you in the past, you aren't going to give it up right away

Hone your proofreading and editing skills.

If you procrastinate on writing because you don't like to re-read what you have written, the good news is this: you can learn specific proofreading, revising, and editing strategies. If you finish your paper ahead of time, and you re-read it, and you don't like it, you have options. Writing a first draft that you don't like doesn't mean you're a terrible writer. Many writers-in fact, I would venture to say most-hate their first drafts. Neither Leo Tolstoy nor Toni Morrison nor John Grisham produce(d) brilliant prose the first time around. In fact, Morrison (a big fan of revision) said recently, "You don't have to love it just because you wrote it!" If you practice some revision and editing strategies, you may feel more comfortable with the idea of re-reading your papers. You'll know that if you find weaknesses in the draft (and you will), you can do something to improve those areas.

Learn how to tell time.

One of the best ways to combat procrastination is to develop a more realistic understanding of time. Procrastinators' views of time tend to be fairly unrealistic. "This paper is only going to take me about five hours to write," you think. "Therefore, I don't need to start on it until the night before." What you may be forgetting, however, is that our time is often filled with more activities than we realize. On the night in question, for instance, let's say you go to the gym at 4:45 p.m. You work out (1 hour), take a shower and dress (30 minutes), eat dinner (45 minutes), and go to a sorority meeting (1 hour). By the time you get back to your dorm room to begin work on the paper, it is already 8:00 p.m. But now you need to check your email and return a couple of phone calls. It's 8:30 p.m. before you finally sit down to write the paper. If the paper does indeed take five hours to write, you will be up until 1:30 in the morning-and that doesn't include the time that you will inevitably spend watching "Will & Grace."

And, as it turns out, it takes about five hours to write a first draft of the essay. You have forgotten to allow time for revision, editing, and proofreading. You get the paper done and turn it in the next morning. But you know it isn't your best work, and you are pretty tired from the late night, and so you make yourself a promise: "Next time, I'll start early!"

Make an unschedule.

The next time you have a writing deadline, try using an un-schedule to outline a realistic plan for when you will write. An un-schedule is a weekly calendar of all the ways in which your time is already accounted for. When you make an un-schedule, you consider not only your timed commitments such as classes and meetings, but also your untimed activities such as meals, exercise, errands, laundry, time with friends and family, and the like. It is not a list of what you should do in a given week; rather it is an outline of the time that you will necessarily spend doing other things besides writing.

Once you have made your un-schedule, take a look at the blank spaces. These represent the maximum number of hours that you could potentially spend writing. By starting with these blank spaces as a guide, you will be able to more accurately predict how much time you will be able to write on any given day. You may be able to see, for instance, that you really don't have five hours to spend writing on the night before the paper is due. By planning accordingly, you will not only get a better night's sleep, you may also end up with a better paper!

The un-schedule might also be a good way to get started on a larger writing project, such as a term paper or an honors thesis. You may think that you have "all semester" to get the writing done, but if you really sit down and map out how much time you have available to write on a daily and weekly basis, you will see that you need to get started sooner, rather than later. In addition, the unschedule may reveal especially busy weeks or months, which will help you budget time for long-term projects.

Perhaps most importantly, the un-schedule can help you examine how you spend your time. You may be surprised at how much (or how little) time you spend watching television, and decide to make a change. It's especially important that you build time for fun activities into your un-schedule. Otherwise, you will procrastinate in order to steal time for relaxation.

You can also use the un-schedule to record your progress towards your goal. Each time you work on your paper, for example, mark it on the un-schedule. One of the most important things you can do to kick the procrastination habit is to reward yourself when you write something, even if (especially if) that writing is only a little piece of the whole. Seeing your success on paper will help reinforce the productive behavior, and you will feel more motivated to write later in the day or week.

Set a time limit.

Okay, so maybe one of the reasons you procrastinate on writing projects is that you just plain hate writing! You would rather be at the dentist than sitting in front of your computer with a blank Microsoft Word document staring you in the face. In that case, it may be helpful to set limits on how much time you will spend writing before you do something else. While the notation "Must work on Hemingway essay all weekend" may not inspire you to sit down and write, "Worked on Hemingway essay for ½ hour" just might. Or, if you tell yourself that you will write "all weekend," for instance, the sheer agony of the thought may keep you from doing any writing at all. If, however, you say that you will write for two hours on Saturday afternoon, you may actually accomplish something. The important thing here is to keep your commitment to yourself. Even if, at the end of the two hours, you think you could keep going, stop. Go outside and enjoy the weather. Your procrastinating self needs to be able to trust your new non-procrastinating self the next time you say you will only write for a certain amount of time. If you go overboard this time, then the next time you say, "I'll write for two hours and then stop," the procrastinator within will respond, "Yeah, right! I'm going rollerblading!"

On the other hand, it may work better for you to trick yourself into working on your paper by telling yourself you're only going to write for two hours, but then continuing to work if you're feeling inspired. Experiment with both approaches and see which one seems to work best for you.

Be realistic about how long it takes you to write.

Procrastinators tend to be heroic about time; they estimate that it will take them two hours to complete a task that would take most people four. Once you have determined that procrastination is hurting your writing, begin taking notice of how long it actually takes you to write. Many students have a "page an hour" rule. Perhaps you can write a page in an hour if you are totally rested, fed, and focused, your roommate isn't home, and the wind is blowing just right. But what if the phone rings, what if you are tired, and what if you have to go to the bathroom? When you estimate how long it will take you to write something, expect that there will be interruptions along the way.

Parting thoughts

As you explore why you procrastinate and experiment with strategies for working differently, don't expect overnight transformation. You developed the procrastination habit over a long period of time; you aren't going to stop magically. But you can change the behavior, bit by bit. If you stop punishing yourself when you procrastinate and start rewarding yourself for your small successes, you will eventually develop new writing habits. And you will get a lot more sleep.

Works Cited

Burka, Jane B. and Lenora M. Yuen. Procrastination: Why You Do It, What to Do About It. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley Publ. Co., 1983. [Not in UNC Libraries: available on the writing center bookshelf]

For further reading

Ellis, Albert, and William J. Overcoming Procrastination. New York: Signet Books, 1977. 

Plagiarism

What this handout is about...

This handout explains what plagiarism is and outlines steps students can follow to avoid plagiarizing.

What is plagiarism?

You may have heard so many different definitions of plagiarism that you feel confused about exactly what it is. Despite all this variation, you can avoid the serious charge of committing plagiarism by adopting a conservative definition of the term and following the guidelines below. The UNC Honor Court defines plagiarism as "the deliberate or reckless representation of another's words, thoughts, or ideas as one's own without attribution in connection with submission of academic work, whether graded or otherwise." (Instrument of Student Judicial Governance, Section II.B.1.).

Why are my instructors so concerned about plagiarism?

In order to understand plagiarism, it helps first to understand the process of sharing and creating ideas in the university. All knowledge is built from previous knowledge. As we read, study, peform experiments, and gather perspectives, we are using other people's ideas. Building on other people's ideas, we create our own. When you put your ideas on paper, your instructors want to distinguish between the building block ideas borrowed from other people and your own newly reasoned perspectives or conclusions. You make these distinctions in a written paper by citing the sources for your building block ideas. Giving clear credit for ideas matters in the professional community as well as in school.

Think of it this way: in the vast majority of assignments you'll get in college, your instructors will ask you to read something (think of this material as the building blocks) and then write a paper in which you analyze one or more aspects of what you have read (think of this as the new structure you build). Essentially, your instructors are asking you to do three things:

· Show that you have a clear understanding of the material you've read (that is, explain who says what about your subject matter).

· Refer to your sources to support the ideas you have developed.

· Distinguish your analysis of what you've read from the author(s) analyses in what you've read.

When you cite a source, you are using an expert's ideas as proof or evidence of a new idea that you are trying to communicate to the reader.

What about "common knowledge"?

Of course, in every professional field, experts consider some ideas "common knowledge," but remember that you're not a professional (yet). In fact, you're just learning about those concepts in the course you're taking, so the material you are reading may not yet be "common knowledge" to you. In order to decide if the material you want to use in your paper constitutes "common knowledge," you may find it helpful to ask yourself the following questions:

· Did I know this information before I took this course?

· Did this information/idea come from my own brain?

If you answer "no" to either or both of these questions, then the information is not "common knowledge" to you. In these cases, you need to cite your source(s) and indicate where you first learned this bit of what may be "common knowledge" in the field.

What about paraphrasing?

Paraphrasing means taking another person's ideas and putting those ideas in your own words. Paraphrasing does NOT mean changing a word or two in someone else's sentence, changing the sentence structure while maintaining the original words, or changing a few words to synonyms. If you are tempted to rearrange a sentence in any of these ways, you are writing too close to the original. That's plagiarizing, not paraphrasing.

Paraphrasing is a fine way to use another person's ideas to support your argument as long as you attribute the material to the author and cite the source in the text at the end of the sentence. In order to make sure you are paraphrasing in the first place, take notes from your reading with the book closed. Doing so will make it easier to put the ideas in your own words. When you are unsure if you are writing too close to the original, check with your instructor BEFORE you turn in the paper for a grade.

How can I avoid plagiarizing?

Now that you understand what plagiarism is, you're ready to employ the following three simple steps to avoid plagiarizing in your written work.

Step 1: Accentuate the positive. Change your attitude about using citations.

Do you feel that you use too many citations? Too few? Many students worry that if they use "too many" citations their instructors will think that they're relying too heavily on the source material and therefore not thinking for themselves. In fact, however, using citations allows you to demonstrate clearly how well you understand the course material while also making clear distinctions between what the author(s) have to say and your analysis of their ideas.

Thus, rather than making your paper look less intellectually sophisticated, using citations allows you to show of your understanding of the material and the assignment. And instead of showing what you don't know, citing your sources provides evidence of what you do know, and of the authority behind your knowledge. Just make sure that your paper has a point, main idea, or thesis that is your own and that you organize the source material around that point.

Are you worried that you have "too few" citations? Double-check your assignment to see if you have been given any indication of the number or kind of source materials expected. Then share your writing with another reader. Do you have enough evidence or proof to support the ideas you put forward? Why should the reader believe the points you have made? Would adding another, expert voice strengthen your argument? Who else agrees or disagrees with the ideas you have written? Have you paraphrased ideas that you have read or heard? If so, you need to cite them. Have you referred to or relied on course material to develop your ideas? If you, you need to cite it as well.

Step 2: How can you keep track of all this information? Improve your note-taking skills.

Once you've reconsidered your position on using citations, you need to rethink your note-taking practices. Taking careful notes is simply the best way to avoid plagiarism. And improving your note-taking skills will also allow you to refine your critical thinking skills. Here's how the process works:

(1) Start by carefully noting all the bibliographic information you'll need for your works cited page. (See #3 for more details on how to determine exactly what information you'll need for different kinds of sources.) If you're photocopying an article or section out of a book or journal, why not photocopy the front pages of the source as well? That way you'll have the bibliographic information if you need it later. If you forget to gather the information for a book, you can usually get it from the library's online card catalogue. Simply pull up the entry for the book you used to see the bibliographic information on that source. If you're working on an article from a journal, you can return to the database from which you got the original citation to find the bibliographic information.

(2) Next, try thinking about your notes as a kind of transitional "space" between what you've read and what you're preparing to write. Imagine yourself having a conversation with the author of the story/novel/play/poem/article/book you're reading, in which you repeatedly ask yourself the following questions:

· What is the author trying to explain?

· Why does s/he think these points are important?

· How has s/he decided to construct the argument?

· How does the structure of the argument affect the reader's response to the author's ideas?

· How effective is the author's argument?

Adopting this "conversational" approach to note-taking will improve your analysis of the material by leading you to notice not just what the author says, but also how and why the author communicates his or her ideas. This strategy will also help you avoid the very common temptation of thinking that the author's way of explaining something is much better than anything you could write. If you are tempted to borrow the author's language, write your notes with the book closed to ensure that you are putting the ideas into your own words. If you've already taken a step "away" from the author's words in your notes, you'll find it easier to use your own words in the paper you write.

(3) Finally, be careful to use quotation marks to distinguish the exact words used by the author from your own words so that when you return to your notes later in the writing process, you won't have to guess which ideas are yours and which ones came directly from the text. You'll have to experiment with different note-taking techniques until you find the one that works best for you, but here's one example of how your notes might look:

James Leoni, trans. Ten Books on Architecture by Leone Battista Alberti. London: Alec Tirani, Ltd., 1955.

BOOK I, CHAPTER X: "Of the Columns and Walls, and Some Observations Relating to the Columns"

· (p. 14) Alberti begins by talking about walls, and then says a row of columns is simply "a Wall open and discontinued in several Places;" he says the column supports the roof, and that columns are the most beautiful of the architectural elements; here, he'll address what columns have in common, and later he'll discuss their differences.

· (p. 14) all columns rest on a plinth (or dye), which supports a base, which supports the column, which is topped by a capital; columns are usually widest at the base, and taper toward the top; Alberti says the column was invented simply to hold up the roof, but men sought to make their buildings "immortal and eternal," so they embellished columns with architraves, entablatures, etc.

Notice that you can adapt this note-taking strategy to any format - whether you prefer to take notes by hand, on note cards, on your computer, or some other way. For more information on developing an effective note-taking technique, you can consult any grammar handbook. Here are a few particularly helpful ones:

· Leonard J. Rosen and Laurence Behren. The Allyn & Bacon Handbook. Boston: Allyn & Bacon, 2000. OR Allyn & Bacon online at: www.abacon.com

· Joseph Gibaldi. MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers. New York: The Modern Language Association of America, 2003.

· Kate L. Turabian. A Manual for Writers of Term Papers, Theses, and Dissertations. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996.

Step 3: So many details, so little time! Locate the appropriate style manual.

Don't worry - no one can remember all the different citation conventions used in all the different university disciplines! Citing your sources appropriately is a matter of:

1. determining which style your instructor wants you to use

2. finding the appropriate style manual

3. copying the "formula" it gives for each type of source you use

First, carefully read the assignment to determine what citation style your instructor wants you to use (APA, MLA, and CBE are the most common). If s/he doesn't specify a citation style in the assignment, check your syllabus and/or coursepack. If you can't find the citation style in either of those places, ask your instructor what style s/he prefers.

Second, academic citation styles follow specific formats, so making an "educated guess" about how to structure your citations and works cited page is usually not a good idea. Instead, find the specified style manual in the reference section of the library, on the reference shelf in the Writing Center, or online.

How can I tell whether I've plagiarized?

If you've followed the above guidelines but still aren't sure whether you've plagiarized, you can double-check your work using the checklist below.

You need to cite your source, even if:

1. you put all direct quotes in quotation marks

2. you changed the words used by the author into synonyms

3. you completely paraphrased the ideas to which you referred

4. your sentence is mostly made up of your own thoughts, but contains a reference to the author's ideas

5. you mention the author's name in the sentence

**The moral of this handout: When in doubt, give a citation**

Bibliography

Alberti, Leone Battista. Ten Books on Architecture. James Leoni, trans. London: Alec Tirani, Ltd., 1955.

Leonard J. Rosen and Laurence Behren. The Allyn & Bacon Handbook. Boston: Allyn & Bacon, 2000. OR Allyn & Bacon online at: www.abacon.com

Joseph Gibaldi. MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers. New York: The Modern Language Association of America, 2003.

Kate L. Turabian. A Manual for Writers of Term Papers, Theses, and Dissertations. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996.

Thesis Statements

What this handout is about…

This handout describes what a thesis statement is, how it works in your writing, and how you can discover or refine one for your draft.

Introduction

Writing in college often takes the form of persuasion, i.e. convincing others that you have an interesting, logical point of view on the subject you are studying. Persuasion is a skill you practice regularly in your daily life. You persuade your roommate to clean up, your parents to let you borrow the car, your friend to vote for your favorite candidate or policy. In college, course assignments often ask you to make a persuasive case in writing. You are asked to convince your reader of your point of view. This form of persuasion, often called academic argument, follows a predictable pattern in writing. After a brief introduction of your topic, you state your point of view on the topic directly and often in one sentence. This sentence is the thesis statement and it serves as a summary of the argument you'll make in the rest of your paper.

What is a thesis statement?

A thesis statement:

· tells the reader how you will interpret the significance of the subject matter under discussion.

· is a road map for the paper; in other words, it tells the reader what to expect from the rest of the paper.

· directly answers the question asked of you. A thesis is an interpretation of a question or subject, not the subject itself. The subject, or topic, of an essay might be World War II or Moby Dick; a thesis must then offer a way to understand the war or the novel that others might dispute.

· is usually a single sentence somewhere in your first paragraph that presents your argument to the reader. The rest of the paper, the body of the essay, gathers and organizes evidence that will persuade the reader of the logic of your interpretation.

If your assignment asks you to take a position or develop a claim about a subject, you may need to convey that position or claim in a thesis statement near the beginning of your draft. The assignment may not explicitly state that you need a thesis statement because your instructor may assume you will include one. When in doubt, ask your instructor if the assignment requires a thesis statement. When an assignment asks you to analyze, to interpret, to compare and contrast, to demonstrate cause and effect, or to take a stand on an issue, it is likely that you are being asked to develop a thesis and to support it persuasively. (Check out our handout, How to Read an Assignment, for more information.)

How do I get a thesis?

A thesis is the result of a lengthy thinking process. Formulating a thesis is not the first thing you do after reading an essay assignment. Before you develop an argument on any topic, you have to collect and organize evidence, look for possible relationships between known facts (such as surprising contrasts or similarities), and think about the significance of these relationships. Once you do this thinking, you will probably have a "working thesis," a basic or main idea, an argument that you think you can support with evidence but that may need adjustment along the way.

Writers use all kinds of techniques to stimulate their thinking and to help them clarify relationships or comprehend the broader significance of a topic and arrive at a thesis statement. For more ideas on how to get started, see our handout on Brainstorming.

How do I know if my thesis is strong?

If there's time, run it by your instructor or make an appointment at the Writing Center to get some feedback. Even if you do not have time to get advice elsewhere, you can do some thesis evaluation of your own. When reviewing your first draft and its working thesis, ask yourself the following:

· Do I answer the question? Re-reading the question prompt after constructing a working thesis can help you fix an argument that misses the focus of the question.

· Have I taken a position that others might challenge or oppose? Thesis statements that are too vague often do not have a strong argument. If your thesis contains words like "good" or "successful," see if you could be more specific: Why is something "good"; What makes something "successful"?

· Does my thesis pass the 'So What?' test? If a reader's first response is, "So what?" then you need to clarify, to forge a relationship, or to connect to a larger issue.

· Does my essay support my thesis specifically and without wandering? If your thesis and the body of your essay do not seem to go together, one of them has to change. Remember, always reassess and revise your writing as necessary.

· Does my thesis pass the how or why test? If a reader's first response is "how? or why? your thesis may be too open-ended and lack guidance for the reader. See what you can add to give the reader a better take on your position right from the beginning.

Examples

Suppose you are taking a course on 19th-century America, and the instructor hands out the following essay assignment: Compare and contrast the reasons why the North and South fought the Civil War. You turn on the computer and type out the following:

The North and South fought the Civil War for many reasons, some of which were the same and some different.

This weak thesis restates the question without providing any additional information. You will expand on this new information in the body of the essay, but it is important that the reader know where you are heading. A reader of this weak thesis might think, "What reasons? How are they the same? How are they different?" Ask yourself these same questions and begin to compare Northern and Southern attitudes ("The South believed slavery was right, and the North thought slavery was wrong"). Now, push your comparison toward an interpretation-why did one side think slavery was right and the other side think it was wrong? You look again at the evidence and you decide the North believed slavery was immoral while the South believed it upheld their way of life. You write:

While both sides fought the Civil War over the issue of slavery, the North fought for moral reasons while the South fought to preserve its own institutions.

Now you have a working thesis! Included in this working thesis is a reason for the war and some idea of how the two sides disagreed over this reason. As you write the essay, you will probably begin to characterize these differences more precisely and your working thesis may seem vague. Maybe you decide that both sides fought for moral reasons, they just saw morality in different contexts. You end up revising the working thesis into a final thesis that really captures the argument in your paper:

While both Northerners and Southerners believed they fought against tyranny and oppression, Northerners focused on the oppression of slaves while Southerners defended their own rights to property and self-government.

Compare this to the original weak thesis. This final thesis presents a way of interpreting evidence that illuminates the significance of the question. Keep in mind that this is one of many possible interpretations of the Civil War-it is not the one and only right answer to the question. There isn't a right answer; there are only strong and weak thesis statements and strong and weak uses of evidence.

Let's look at another example. Suppose your literature professor hands out the following assignment in a class on the American novel: Write an analysis of some aspect of Mark Twain's novel Huckleberry Finn. "This will be easy," you think. "I loved Huckleberry Finn!" You grab a pad of paper and write:

Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn is a great American novel.

Why is this thesis weak? Think about what the reader would expect from the essay that follows: you will most likely provide a general, appreciative summary of Twain's novel. The question did not ask you to summarize, it asked you to analyze. Your professor is probably not interested in your opinion of the novel; instead, she wants you to think about why it's such a great novel-what do Huck's adventures tell us about life, about America, about coming of age, about race relations, etc.? First, the question asks you to pick an aspect of the novel that you think is important to its structure or meaning-for example, the role of storytelling, the contrasting scenes between the shore and the river, or the relationships between adults and children. Now you write:

In Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain develops a contrast between life on the river and life on the shore.

Here's a working thesis with potential: you have highlighted an important aspect of the novel for investigation; however, it's still not clear what your analysis will reveal. Your reader is intrigued, but is still thinking, "So what? What's the point of this contrast? What does it signify?" Perhaps you are not sure yet, either. That's fine-begin to work on comparing scenes from the book and see what you discover. Free write, make lists, jot down Huck's actions and reactions. Eventually you will be able to clarify for yourself, and then for the reader, why this contrast matters. After examining the evidence and considering your own insights, you write:

Through its contrasting river and shore scenes, Twain's Huckleberry Finn suggests that to find the true expression of American democratic ideals, one must leave "civilized" society and go back to nature.

This final thesis statement presents an interpretation of a literary work based on an analysis of its content. Of course, for the essay itself to be successful, you must now present evidence from the novel that will convince the reader of your interpretation.

Bibliography

Anson, Chris M. and Robert A. Schwegler. The Longman Handbook for Writers. 2nd ed. New York: Longman, 2000.

Hairston, Maxine and John J. Ruszkiewicz. The Scott, Foresman Handbook for Writers. 4th ed. New York: HarperCollins, 1996.

Lunsford, Andrea and Robert Connors. The St. Martin's Handbook. 3rd ed. New York: St. Martin's, 1995.

Rosen, Leonard J. and Laurence Behrens. The Allyn & Bacon Handbook. 3rd ed. Boston: Allyn & Bacon, 1997.

 

Quotations

What this handout is about...

Used effectively, quotations can provide important pieces of evidence and lend fresh voices and perspectives to your narrative. Used ineffectively, however, quotations clutter your text and interrupt the flow of your argument. This handout will help you decide when to quote and how to quote like a pro.

When should I quote?

Use quotations at strategically selected moments. You have probably been told by teachers to provide as much evidence as possible in support of your thesis. But packing your paper with quotations will not necessarily strengthen your argument. The majority of your paper should still be your original ideas in your own words (after all, it's your paper). And quotations are only one type of evidence: well-balanced papers may also make use of paraphrases, data, and statistics. The types of evidence you use will depend in part on the conventions of the discipline or audience for which you are writing. For example, papers analyzing literature may rely heavily on direct quotations of the text, while papers in the social sciences may have more paraphrasing, data, and statistics than quotations.

1. Discussing specific arguments or ideas.

Sometimes, in order to debate with clarity and specificity the ideas of others, you need to quote those ideas word for word. So, suppose you want to challenge the following statement made by John Doe, a well-known historian:

At the beginning of World War Two, almost all Americans assumed the war would end quickly.

If it is especially important that you formulate a counter-argument to this claim, then you might wish to quote the part of the statement that you find questionable and establish a dialogue between yourself and John Doe:

Historian John Doe has argued that in 1941 "almost all Americans assumed the war would end quickly" (Doe 223). Yet during the first six months of U.S. involvement, the wives and mothers of soldiers often noted in their diaries their fear that the war would drag on for years.

2. Giving added emphasis to a particularly authoritative source on your topic.

There will be times when you want to highlight the words of a particularly important and authoritative source on your topic. For example, suppose you were writing an essay about the differences between the lives of male and female slaves in the U.S. South. One of your most provocative sources is a narrative written by a former slave, Harriet Jacobs. It would then be appropriate to quote some of Jacobs's words:

Harriet Jacobs, a former slave from North Carolina, published an autobiographical slave narrative in 1861. She exposed the hardships of both male and female slaves but ultimately concluded that "slavery is terrible for men; but it is far more terrible for women."

In this particular example, Jacobs is providing a crucial first-hand perspective on slavery. Thus, her words deserve more exposure than a paraphrase could provide.

Jacobs quoted in Harriet A. Jacobs, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, ed. Jean Fagan Yellin (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1987).

3. Analyzing how others use language.

This scenario is probably most common in literature and linguistics courses, but you might also find yourself writing about the use of language in history and social science classes. If the use of language is your primary topic, then you will obviously need to quote users of that language.

Examples of topics that might require the frequent use of quotations include:

Southern Colloquial Expressions in William Faulkner's Light in August

Ms. and the Creation of a Language of Female Empowerment

A Comparison of Three British Poets and Their Use of Meter

4. Spicing up your prose.

In order to lend variety to your prose, you may wish to quote a source with particularly vivid language. All quotations, however, must closely relate to your to your topic and arguments. Do not insert a quotation solely for its literary merits.

One example of a quotation that adds flair:

Calvin Coolidge's tendency to fall asleep became legendary. As H. L. Mencken commented in the American Mercury in 1933, "Nero fiddled, but Coolidge only snored."

How do I set up and follow up a quotation?

Once you've carefully selected the quotations that you want to use, your next job is to weave those quotations into your text. The words that precede and follow a quotation are just as important as the quotation itself. Below are four guidelines for "setting up" and "following up" quotations.

In illustrating these four steps, we'll use as our example, Franklin Roosevelt's famous quotation, "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."

1. Provide a context for each quotation.

Do not rely on quotations to tell your story for you. It is your responsibility to provide your reader with a context for the quotation. The context should set the basic scene for when, possibly where, and under what circumstances the quotation was spoken or written. So, in providing a context for our above example, you might write:

When Franklin Roosevelt gave his inaugural speech on March 4, 1933, he addressed a nation weakened and demoralized by economic depression.

2. Attribute each quotation to its source.

Even if you place an internal citation after a quotation, you must still attribute the quotation within the text. What is attribution? Simply tell your reader who is speaking. A good rule of thumb is this: Try reading your text aloud. Could your reader determine without looking at your paper where your quotations begin? If not, your paper probably contains "hanging quotations," which leave your reader hanging because they lack attribution.

Avoid the attribution rut! There are many ways to attribute quotes besides the common "he/she said" construction. Here are a few alternative verbs:

add

remark

exclaim

announce

reply

state

comment

respond

estimate

write

retort

predict

argue

opine

propose

declare

criticize

proclaim

note

complain

 

observe

question

 

(If you're unfamiliar with the meanings of any of these words, consult a dictionary before using them!) 

3. Explain the significance of the quotation.

Once you've inserted your quotation, along with its context and attribution, don't stop! Your reader still needs your assessment of why the quotation holds significance for your paper. Using our Roosevelt example, if you were writing a paper on the first one-hundred days of FDR's administration, you might follow the quotation by linking it to that topic:

With that message of hope and confidence, the new president set the stage for his next one-hundred days in office and helped restore the faith of the American people in their government.

4. Provide a citation for the quotation.

All quotations, just like all paraphrases, require a formal citation. For more details about particular citation formats, see our handouts on the MLA, CBE, and APA styles. In general, you should remember one rule of thumb: Place the parenthetical reference or footnote/endnote number after-not within-the closed quotation mark.

Roosevelt declared, "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself" (Roosevelt, Public Papers 11).

Roosevelt declared, "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."1

How much should I quote?

As few words as possible. Remember, any paper that you author should primarily contain your own words. So, quote only the most pithy and memorable parts of sources. Here are three guidelines for selecting quoted material judiciously.

1. Excerpt fragments.

Sometimes, you should quote short fragments, rather than whole sentences. Suppose you interviewed "Jane Doe" about her reaction to John F. Kennedy's assassination. She commented:

"I couldn't believe it. It was just unreal and so sad. It was just unbelievable. I had never experienced such denial. I don't know why I felt so strongly. Perhaps it was because JFK was more to me than a president. He represented the hopes of young people everywhere."

You could quote all of Jane's comments, but her first three sentences are fairly redundant. You might instead want to quote Jane when she arrives at the ultimate reason for her strong emotions:

Jane Doe grappled with grief and disbelief. She had viewed JFK, not just as a national figurehead, but as someone who "represented the hopes of young people everywhere."

 

2. Excerpt those fragments carefully!

Quoting the words of others carries a big responsibility. Misquoting misrepresents the ideas of others. Here's a classic example of a misquote:

John Adams has often been quoted as having said: "This would be the best of all possible worlds if there were no religion in it."

John Adams did, in fact, write the above words. But if you see those words in context, the meaning changes entirely. Here's the rest of the quotation:

Twenty times, in the course of my late reading, have I been on the point of breaking out, 'this would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it!!!!' But in this exclamation, I should have been as fanatical as Bryant or Cleverly. Without religion, this world would be something not fit to be mentioned in public company-I mean hell.

As you can see from this example, context matters!

Example from: Paul F. Boller, Jr. and John George, They Never Said It: A Book of Fake Quotes, Misquotes, and Misleading Attributions. Oxford University Press, 1989.

 

3. Use block quotations sparingly.

There may be times when you need to quote long passages. However, you should use block quotations only when you fear that omitting any words will destroy the integrity of the passage. If that passage exceeds four lines (some sources say five), then set it off as a block quotation.

Here are a few general tips for setting off your block quotation:

1. Set up a block quotation with your own words followed by a colon.

2. Indent. You normally indent 4-5 spaces for the start of a paragraph. When setting up a block quotation, indent the entire paragraph once from the left-hand margin.

3. Single space or double space within the block quotation, depending on the style guidelines of your discipline (MLA, CBE, APA, Chicago, etc.).

4. Do not use quotation marks at the beginning or end of the block quote-the indentation is what indicates that it's a quote.

5. Place parenthetical citation according to your style guide (usually after the period following the last sentence of the quote).

6. Follow up a block quotation with your own words.

So, using the above example from John Adams, here's how you might include a block quotation:

After reading several doctrinally rigid tracts, John Adams recalled the zealous ranting of his former teacher, Joseph Cleverly, and minister, Lemuel Bryant. He expressed his ambivalence toward religion in an 1817 letter to Thomas Jefferson:

Twenty times, in the course of my late reading, have I been on the point of breaking out, 'this would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it!!!!' But in this exclamation, I should have been as fanatical as Bryant or Cleverly. Without religion, this world would be something not fit to be mentioned in public company-I mean hell.

Adams clearly appreciated religion, even if he often questioned its promotion.

How do I combine quotation marks with other punctuation marks?

It can be confusing when you start combining quotation marks with other punctuation marks. You should consult a style manual for complicated situations, but the following two rules apply to most cases:

1) Keep periods and commas within quotation marks.

So, for example:

According to Professor Jones, Lincoln "feared the spread of slavery," but many of his aides advised him to "watch and wait."

In the above example, both the comma and period were enclosed in the quotation marks. The main exception to this rule involves the use of internal citations, which always precede the last period of the sentence. For example:

According to Professor Jones, Lincoln "feared the spread of slavery," but many of his aides advised him to "watch and wait" (Jones 143).

Note, however, that the period remains inside the quotation marks when your citation style involved superscript footnotes or endnotes. For example:

According to Professor Jones, Lincoln "feared the spread of slavery," but many of his aides advised him to "watch and wait."2

2) Place all other punctuation marks (colons, semicolons, exclamation marks, question marks) outside the quotation marks, except when they were part of the original quotation.

Take a look at the following examples:

The student wrote that the U. S. Civil War "finally ended around 1900"!

The coach yelled, "Run!"

In the first example, the author placed the exclamation point outside the quotation mark because she added it herself to emphasize the absurdity of the student's comment. The student's original comment had not included an exclamation mark. In the second example, the exclamation mark remains within the quotation mark because it is indicating the excited tone in which the coach yelled the command. Thus, the exclamation mark is considered to be part of the original quotation.

How do I indicate quotations within quotations?

If you are quoting a passage that contains a quotation, then you use single quotation marks for the internal quotation. Quite rarely, you quote a passage that has a quotation within a quotation. In that rare instance, you would use double quotation marks for the second internal quotation.

Here's an example of a quotation within a quotation:

In "The Emperor's New Clothes," Hans Christian Andersen wrote, "'But the Emperor has nothing on at all!' cried a little child."

Remember to consult your style guide to determine how to properly cite a quote within a quote.

When do I use those three dots ( . . . )?

Whenever you want to leave out material from within a quotation, you need to use an ellipsis, which is a series of three periods, each of which should be preceded and followed by a space. So, an ellipsis in this sentence would look like . . . this. There are a few rules to follow when using ellipses:

1. Be sure that you don't fundamentally change the meaning of the quotation by omitting material.

Take a look at the following example:

"The Writing Center is located on the UNC campus and serves the entire UNC community."

"The Writing Center . . . serves the entire UNC community."

The reader's understanding of the Writing Center's mission to serve the UNC community is not affected by omitting the information about its location.

2. Do not use ellipses at the beginning or ending of quotations, unless it's important for the reader to know that the quotation was truncated.

For example, using the above example, you would NOT need an ellipsis in either of these situations:

"The Writing Center is located on the UNC campus . . ."

The Writing Center " . . . serves the entire UNC community."

3. Use punctuation marks in combination with ellipses when removing material from the end of sentences or clauses.

For example, if you take material from the end of a sentence, keep the period in as usual.

"The boys ran to school. Even though they were out of breath, they made it on time."

"The boys ran to school. . . . they made it on time."

Likewise, if you excerpt material at the end of clause that ends in a comma, retain the comma.

"The red car came to a screeching halt that was heard by nearby pedestrians, but no one was hurt."

"The red car came to a screeching halt . . . , but no one was hurt."

Is it ever okay to insert my own words or change words in a quotation?

Sometimes it is necessary for clarity and flow to alter a word or words within a quotation. You should make such changes rarely. In order to alert your reader to the changes you've made, you should always bracket the altered words. Here are a few examples of situations when you might need brackets.

1. Changing verb tense or pronouns in order to be consistent with the rest of the sentence.

Suppose you were quoting a woman who, when asked about her experiences immigrating to the United States, commented "nobody understood me." You might write:

Esther Hansen felt that when she came to the United States "nobody understood [her]."

In the above example, you've changed "me" to "her" in order to keep the entire passage in third person. However, you could avoid the need for this change by simply rephrasing:

"Nobody understood me," recalled Danish immigrant Esther Hansen.

2. Including supplemental information that your reader needs in order to understand the quotation.

For example, if you were quoting someone's nickname, you might want to let your reader know the full name of that person in brackets.

"The principal of the school told Billy [William Smith] that his contract would be terminated."

Similarly, if a quotation referenced an event with which the reader might be unfamiliar, you could identify that event in brackets.

"We completely revised our political strategies after the strike [of 1934]."

3. Indicating the use of nonstandard grammar or spelling.

In rare situations, you may quote from a text that has nonstandard grammar, spelling, or word choice. In such cases, you may want to insert [sic], which means "thus" or "so" in Latin. Using [sic] alerts your reader to the fact that this nonstandard language is not the result of a typo on your part. Always italicize "sic" and enclose it in brackets. There is no need to put a period at the end. Here's an example of when you might use [sic]:

Twelve-year old Betsy Smith wrote in her diary, "Father is afraid that he will be guilty of beach [sic] of contract."

Here [sic] indicates that the original author wrote "beach of contract," not breach of contract, which is the accepted terminology.

4. Do not overuse brackets!

For example, it is not necessary to bracket capitalization changes that you make at the beginning of sentences. For example, suppose you were going to use part of this quotation:

"We never looked back, but the memory of our army days remained with us the rest of our lives."

If you wanted to begin a sentence with an excerpt from the middle of this quotation, there would be no need to bracket your capitalization changes.

"The memory of our army days remained with us the rest of our lives," commented Joe Brown, a World War II veteran.

Not

"[T]he memory of our army days remained with us the rest of our lives," commented Joe Brown, a World War II veteran.

Bibliography

Barzun, Jacques and Henry F. Graff. The Modern Researcher. 6th Edition. Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 2004.

Booth, Wayne C., Gregory G. Colomb, and Joseph M. Williams. The Craft of Research, 2nd Edition. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2003.

Gibaldi, Joseph. MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers, 6th Edition. New York: The Modern Language Association of America, 2003.

Turabian, Kate L. A Manual for Writers of Term Papers, Theses, and Dissertations. 6th Edition. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996.

 

FOOTNOTES AND CITATION OF SOURCES

From the Writing Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison

http://www.wisc.edu/writing/Handbook/DocChicago.html - Will create footnotes for you, and your bibliography in Chicago style!!!

How to avoid plagiarism

When using secondary sources in your papers, you can avoid plagiarism by knowing what must be documented.

Specific words and phrases

If you use an author's specific word or words, you must place those words within quotation marks and you must credit the source.

Information and Ideas

Even if you use your own words, if you obtained the information or ideas you are presenting from a source, you must document the source.

Information: If a piece of information isn?t common knowledge (see #3 below), you need to provide a source.

Ideas: An author's ideas may include not only points made and conclusions drawn, but, for instance, a specific method or theory, the arrangement of material, or a list of steps in a process or characteristics of a medical condition. If a source provided any of these, you need to acknowledge the source.

top

Common Knowledge?

You do not need to cite a source for material considered common knowledge:

General common knowledge is factual information considered to be in the public domain, such as birth and death dates of well-known figures, and generally accepted dates of military, political, literary, and other historical events. In general, factual information contained in multiple standard reference works can usually be considered to be in the public domain.

Field-specific common knowledge is "common" only within a particular field or specialty. It may include facts, theories, or methods that are familiar to readers within that discipline. For instance, you may not need to cite a reference to Piaget?s developmental stages in a paper for an education class or give a source for your description of a commonly used method in a biology report?but you must be sure that this information is so widely known within that field that it will be shared by your readers.

If in doubt, be cautious and cite the source. And in the case of both general and field-specific common knowledge, if you use the exact words of the reference source, you must use quotation marks and credit the source.

Should I paraphrase or quote?

In general, use direct quotations only if you have a good reason. Most of your paper should be in your own words. Also, it's often conventional to quote more extensively from sources when you're writing a humanities paper, and to summarize from sources when you're writing in the social or natural sciences--but there are always exceptions.

In a literary analysis paper, for example, you''ll want to quote from the literary text rather than summarize, because part of your task in this kind of paper is to analyze the specific words and phrases an author uses.

In research papers, you should quote from a source

· to show that an authority supports your point

· to present a position or argument to critique or comment on

· to include especially moving or historically significant language

· to present a particularly well-stated passage whose meaning would be lost or changed if paraphrased or summarized

You should summarize or paraphrase when

· what you want from the source is the idea expressed, and not the specific language used to express it

· you can express in fewer words what the key point of a source is

Successful vs. unsuccessful paraphrases

Paraphrasing is often defined as putting a passage from an author into “your own words.” But what are your own words? How different must your paraphrase be from the original?

The paragraphs below provide an example by showing a passage as it appears in the source, two paraphrases that follow the source too closely, and a legitimate paraphrase.

The student’s intention was to incorporate the material in the original passage into a section of a paper on the concept of “experts” that compared the functions of experts and nonexperts in several professions.

The Passage as It Appears in the Source

Critical care nurses function in a hierarchy of roles. In this open heart surgery unit, the nurse manager hires and fires the nursing personnel. The nurse manager does not directly care for patients but follows the progress of unusual or long-term patients. On each shift a nurse assumes the role of resource nurse. This person oversees the hour-by-hour functioning of the unit as a whole, such as considering expected admissions and discharges of patients, ascertaining that beds are available for patients in the operating room, and covering sick calls. Resource nurses also take a patient assignment. They are the most experienced of all the staff nurses. The nurse clinician has a separate job description and provides for quality of care by orienting new staff, developing unit policies, and providing direct support where needed, such as assisting in emergency situations. The clinical nurse specialist in this unit is mostly involved with formal teaching in orienting new staff. The nurse manager, nurse clinician, and clinical nurse specialist are the designated experts. They do not take patient assignments. The resource nurse is seen as both a caregiver and a resource to other caregivers. . . . Staff nurses have a hierarchy of seniority. . . . Staff nurses are assigned to patients to provide all their nursing care. (Chase, 1995, p. 156)

top

Word-for-Word Plagiarism

Critical care nurses have a hierarchy of roles. The nurse manager hires and fires nurses. S/he does not directly care for patients but does follow unusual or long-term cases. On each shift a resource nurse attends to the functioning of the unit as a whole, such as making sure beds are available in the operating room, and also has a patient assignment. The nurse clinician orients new staff, develops policies, and provides support where needed. The clinical nurse specialist also orients new staff, mostly by formal teaching. The nurse manager, nurse clinician, and clinical nurse specialist, as the designated experts, do not take patient assignments. The resource nurse is not only a caregiver but a resource to the other caregivers. Within the staff nurses there is also a hierarchy of seniority. Their job is to give assigned patients all their nursing care.

Why this is plagiarism

top

A Patchwork Paraphrase

Chase (1995) describes how nurses in a critical care unit function in a hierarchy that places designated experts at the top and the least senior staff nurses at the bottom. The experts — the nurse manager, nurse clinician, and clinical nurse specialist — are not involved directly in patient care. The staff nurses, in contrast, are assigned to patients and provide all their nursing care. Within the staff nurses is a hierarchy of seniority in which the most senior can become resource nurses: they are assigned a patient but also serve as a resource to other caregivers. The experts have administrative and teaching tasks such as selecting and orienting new staff, developing unit policies, and giving hands-on support where needed.

Why this is plagiarism

top

A Legitimate Paraphrase

In her study of the roles of nurses in a critical care unit, Chase (1995) also found a hierarchy that distinguished the roles of experts and others. Just as the educational experts described above do not directly teach students, the experts in this unit do not directly attend to patients. That is the role of the staff nurses, who, like teachers, have their own “hierarchy of seniority” (p. 156). The roles of the experts include employing unit nurses and overseeing the care of special patients (nurse manager), teaching and otherwise integrating new personnel into the unit (clinical nurse specialist and nurse clinician), and policy-making (nurse clinician). In an intermediate position in the hierarchy is the resource nurse, a staff nurse with more experience than the others, who assumes direct care of patients as the other staff nurses do, but also takes on tasks to ensure the smooth operation of the entire facility.

Why this is a good paraphrase

top

Perhaps you’ve noticed that a number of phrases from the original passage appear in the legitimate paraphrase: critical care, staff nurses, nurse manager, clinical nurse specialist, nurse clinician, resource nurse.

If all these phrases were in red, the paraphrase would look much like the “patchwork” example. The difference is that the phrases in the legitimate paraphrase are all precise, economical, and conventional designations that are part of the shared language within the nursing discipline (in the too-close paraphrases, they’re red only when used within a longer borrowed phrase).

In every discipline and in certain genres (such as the empirical research report), some phrases are so specialized or conventional that you can’t paraphrase them except by wordy and awkward circumlocutions that would be less familiar (and thus less readable) to the audience.

When you repeat such phrases, you’re not stealing the unique phrasing of an individual writer but using a common vocabulary shared by a community of scholars.

Some Examples of Shared LanguageYou Don’t Need to Put in Quotation Marks

· Conventional designations: e.g., physician’s assistant, chronic low-back pain

· Preferred bias-free language: e.g., persons with disabilities

· Technical terms and phrases of a discipline or genre: e.g., reduplication, cognitive domain, material culture, sexual harassment

References

Chase, S. K. (1995). The social context of critical care clinical judgment.

Heart and Lung, 24, 154-162.

How to paraphrase a source

General advice

1. When reading a passage, try first to understand it as a whole, rather than pausing to write down specific ideas or phrases.

2. Be selective. Unless your assignment is to do a formal or "literal" paraphrase, you usually don’t need to paraphrase an entire passage; instead, choose and summarize the material that helps you make a point in your paper.

3. Think of what "your own words" would be if you were telling someone who's unfamiliar with your subject (your mother, your brother, a friend) what the original source said.

4. Remember that you can use direct quotations of phrases from the original within your paraphrase, and that you don't need to change or put quotation marks around shared language.

top

Methods of Paraphrasing

A. Look away from the source;then write.

Read the text you want to paraphrase several times until you feel that you understand it and can use your own words to restate it to someone else. Then, look away from the original and rewrite the text in your own words.

B. Take notes.

Take abbreviated notes; set the notes aside; then paraphrase from the notes a day or so later, or when you draft.

If you find that you can't do A or B, this may mean that you don't understand the passage completely or that you need to use a more structured process until you have more experience in paraphrasing.

The method below is not only a way to create a paraphrase but also a way to understand a difficult text.

C. While looking at the source, first change the structure, then the words.

For example, consider the following passage from Love and Toil (a book on motherhood in London from 1870 to 1918), in which the author, Ellen Ross, puts forth one of her major arguments:

Love and Toil maintains that family survival was the mother's main charge among the large majority of London?s population who were poor or working class; the emotional and intellectual nurture of her child or children and even their actual comfort were forced into the background. To mother was to work for and organize household subsistence. (p. 9)

top

Change the structure

Begin by starting at a different place in the passage and/or sentence(s), basing your choice on the focus of your paper. This will lead naturally to some changes in wording. Some places you might start in the passage above are "The mother's main charge," "Among the . . . poor or working class," "Working for and organizing household subsistence," or "The emotional and intellectual nurture." Or you could begin with one of the people the passage is about: "Mothers," "A mother," "Children," "A child." Focusing on specific people rather than abstractions will make your paraphrase more readable.

At this stage, you might also break up long sentences, combine short ones, expand phrases for clarity, or shorten them for conciseness, or you might do this in an additional step. In this process, you'll naturally eliminate some words and change others.

Here's one of the many ways you might get started with a paraphrase of the passage above by changing its structure. In this case, the focus of the paper is the effect of economic status on children at the turn of the century, so the writer begins with children:

Children of the poor at the turn of the century received little if any emotional or intellectual nurturing from their mothers, whose main charge was family survival. Working for and organizing household subsistence were what defined mothering. Next to this, even the children's bas