Hermes Pre AP/IB English 9

Research Style Guide

Submission Standards:

· Your paper needs to be typed (black ink) on white paper and double-spaced.

· The 12-point font should be conservative – either “Times New Roman” or “Arial “ are good choices.

· It needs to be about three (3) pages in length.

· It must include a works cited page with a minimum of five annotated sources.

· Your paper must include in-text citations for all quoted, paraphrased, and summarized information.

Tone:

· The paper is an academic research paper. The tone needs to be formal and objective. Avoid using pronouns (I, we, one) in your paper.

· Your job is to communicate “just the facts” about your issue. This is not the place to disclose your personal thoughts and feelings about the issue.

· Report all background information and facts you deem essential to your issue.

MLA Documentation:

The Modern Language Association (MLA) style is widely used to document sources in writing. MLA style requires documentation of sources on a separate page titled Works Cited AND in the text of your paper after every quotation, paraphrase, and summary (in-text, or internal, citations).

The Works Cited Page:

· Refer to your student planner (pages 20 & 21).

· A list of works cited is an alphabetical list of the source you have referred to in your essay.

· Start your list on a separate page after the text of your essay.

· Type the heading Works Cited, not underlined, italicized, or in quotation marks, centered one inch from the top of the page.

· Start each entry flush with the left margin; indent subsequent lines.

· Double-space the entire list.

· List sources alphabetically by author’s last name. If the author is unknown, alphabetize the source by the first major word of the title.

In-Text Citations:

· “In-text”, or “internal”, citations are a way to immediately acknowledge the source of the information you use in your research paper. Failure to cite a source is the same as copying. In-text citations protect you from charges of plagiarism.

· The MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers suggests giving credit in the body of your research paper rather than in footnotes or endnotes. To give credit, simply insert the appropriate information (usually author and page number) in parentheses after the words or ideas borrowed from another source. Place them where a pause would naturally occur to avoid disrupting the flow of your writing (usually at the end of a sentence). Make sure all of your sources are listed in the works cited list at the end of your paper.

· (Viola 36-43) is an example of how an in-text citation. The information in parenthesis is usually the author’s last name and the page number of the text from which the information was taken. If the author of the article is unknown, the title of the article should be used instead. This directly relates to your works cited page.

· When to use in-text citations?

1. If the information is a direct quotation

2. If the information is very specific and not common knowledge

3. If the information is paraphrased or summarized

· If several sentences of information come from the same source, simply use an internal citation once in the paragraph.

· If several sentences in the paragraph come from different sources, you will need to cite each source separately if the information is all very specific. It is common to have a long paragraph with multiple citations.

· Problems with citing sources:

· If the author of a text is unknown, do not use the word “anonymous”. Use part of the title of the article or book followed by the page number.

· If the titles are similar, as is the case with web address titles, use part of the web address followed by several periods and then the page number. You do not need to write out the full web address unless several of the addresses are very similar.

· Web pages often do not have page numbers. Count the paragraphs and use “par.” to record the paragraph in which the information was taken. For example (“Globalization: Threat or Opportunity?” par. 7).

· Do not end a paragraph with a citation. A citation comes after a concrete detail. Your paragraphs should end with commentary and a transition to the next paragraph.

Using Source Materials:

Quotations:

· Because your essay is primarily written in your own style, limit your use of quotations.

· Use direct quotations to include a statement expressed so effectively by the author that it cannot be paraphrased without altering the meaning or to allow the words of authority on your topic to contribute to your research credibility.

· Short quotations – those quotations shorter than four lines – should be enclosed by quotation marks.

· Direct quotations that are longer than four lines long need to be set off from the regular text. Begin longer quotations on a new line, and tab over twice from the left margin. The indentation sets off the quotation clearly, so quotation marks are unnecessary. Type the quotation to the right margin and double-space as with the regular text.

Signal Phrases:

· The difficulty with using quotations is that they are written in someone else’s voice and style. If you use a lot of quotations, your paper will suffer from a lack of stylistic consistency. Using a signal phrase is a good way to incorporate quotations into your paper so that they flow smoothly and clearly into the surrounding sentences.

· A signal phrase introduces a quotation, paraphrase, or summary and includes the author’s name or title of the book or article being cited. This has the added benefit of allowing you to reduce the in-text citation to only the page number.

Paraphrasing:

· When you paraphrase, you put an author’s words and sentence structure into YOUR OWN words and sentence structure. It is not okay to simply change a word here and there or omit a few sentences. You really have to understand what you are reading and then represent the ideas in your voice, using your style.

· If you wish to cite some of the author’s words within the paraphrase, enclose them in quotation marks.

· Include all main points and details in the same order in which the author presents them.

· Recheck the paraphrase against the original to be sure that the words and sentence structures are your own and that they express the author’s meaning accurately.

Summarizing:

· A summary is a significantly shortened version of a passage or even a whole chapter or work that captures main ideas in YOUR OWN words.

· Unlike a paraphrase, a summary uses just enough information to record the points you wish to emphasize. It states the author’s main points selectively and without using his or her words.

· A summary is far shorter than the original.