NEXT YEAR INCLUDE EXAMPLES FROM PAPERS OF POOR JOB ON THIS TOPIC.

Writers’ Workshop
Incorporating Direct Textual Evidence into Body Paragraphs

Each body paragraph of an essay should deal with a particular point of support mentioned in the thesis. You already know this.

You also already know that each body paragraph should start with a transition and topic sentence, but where do you go from there in terms of expanding on the piece of support from your thesis?

Returning to the “argument with your friend” strategy we’ve been looking at all along, a good place to turn at this point in your argument is to some direct evidence. If you are talking about the Jets, it might be statistics. If you’re talking about literature, this direct evidence is textual support.

TEXTUAL SUPPORT

There are two types of textual support that can be used in the body paragraphs.

  1. Paraphrasing a segment of the work as support for your argument.
  2. Example: Jim shows he is a good person when he helps Tom recover from injury.

This is obviously pretty weak. It is vague and feels like book reporting. You should avoid paraphrasing.

  1. Direct quotation: this is when you take a section word-for-word from the pages of the work.
  2. Example: Jim confirms his status as “better” and “faithfuller” (256) than the other characters when he refuses to leave Tom, claiming “I doan’ budge a step out’ndis place, ’dout a doctor; not if it’s forty year!” (248).

A direct quotation (or a few) is much stronger and drives the point home more clearly. Think again about having an argument with your friend. Isn’t it better when he/she uses specific information rather than just vague statements?

For example, if you’re trying to convince your friend that Ke$ha is better than The Beatles as musical artists you could say

Ke$ha is clearly a greater musical artist than The Beatles because she has a better sound and sells a lot of records.

Or, you could make a specific argument:

Ke$ha is obviously a superior musician to The Beatles, as seen by the fact that her hit song “Tik-Tok” has sold more copies than any of The Beatles singles (“12 Extremely Disappointing Facts”).

Note: For an in-text citation, the period comes AFTER the parenthetical citation, not before.

FORMATTING

So now that you are convinced that direct textual support in the form of a quotation from the work is superior to simple paraphrasing, let’s look at where it goes in the paragraph itself. First, a couple tips:

1.A quote should not start your paragraph. The first sentence of your paragraph should be a topic sentence (transition + subject of thesis + stance + single support = topic sentence).

2.Your quote should not be the entire second sentence of your paragraph, either. You need to introduce your quote with some context (background information) and an introductory phrase.

  1. For example, here is the beginning to a body paragraph about Twain’s criticism of religion. It includes a topic sentence and a quote:

To begin, Twain clearly criticizes southern Christianity through his portrayal of the Grangerfords and the Shepherdsons. Two feuding families that ironically don’t understand the true meaning behind their Christian religion, both groups are described by Huck as going “to church about three mile, everybody a-horseback. The men took their guns along, so did Buck, and kept them…handy.” By having both families bring weapons to a Christian service that preached “brotherly love,” Twain illustrates the fundamental ignorance of both the Grangerfords and Shepherdsons about the faith they worship (101). In doing so, Twain is also satirizing all such Christians who claim one creed with their voices, but practice another with their hands.

3.Notice that the quote is not simply plopped in the middle of the paragraph without integration, but exists as part of another sentence. It also has a little (not a lot) of contextual information around it.

4.Feel free to use multiple quotes within a paragraph, and to use phrases from the book. It does not have to be a full sentence to be used as direct textual evidence.

  1. So how much of my essay should be directly quoted textual evidence? A good rule of thumb is that directly quoted material should not compose more than 10% of your essay, and should be broken up throughout the essay itself (none coming in one big quote in a single paragraph).

5.Lastly, do NOT end a paragraph with your quote. You should have at least a sentence of explanation following the quote, explaining what it is illustrating. Try to avoid saying “This quote shows…” Thatsounds kind of amateurish.

6.To make this as scientific as possible, here is a general formula for integrating a quote into your body paragraph:

  1. Topic sentence (1-2 sentences)
  2. Introductory and contextual information (1-2 sentences)
  3. Quote (hopefully integrated into a sentence)
  4. Explanation (1-2 sentences)

PRACTICE

The subject of your essay is the raft. The stance is that it provides a sanctuary for the characters when land does not. The piece of support is Huck’s comments upon returning to the raft after the feud. The quote you’ll use to support is “There warn’t no home like a raft after all. Other places do seem so cramped up and smothery, but a raft don’t” (107). Build a body paragraph to be turned-in based on this information.