Three Basic Principles for Integrating Sources
Should I Quote or Paraphrase?
A source can appear in your paper in different ways. You can briefly mention it; you can summarize its main ideas, events, or data; you can paraphrase one of its statements or passages; or you can quote the source directly. Let three principles govern your thinking about these options.
PRINCIPLE 1:Use sources as concisely as possible, so your own thinking isn't crowded out by your presentation of other people's thinking, or your own voice by your quoting of other voices. Citing the ideas or the evidence from a source well often requires the writer to actually work out for themselves what they mean and as a result the writing is clearer.
A good reason to paraphrase--to restate in your own words the full meaning of a phrase-- is if the phrase or passage is difficult, complex, or ambiguous. Another reason to paraphrase is to avoid using, in a summary, the same phrases your source does.
A good reason to quote: the quote as written should be good – that means that it is worded more clearly than you could ever do yourself. Ideally, you are hoping to show something by quoting.
A warning about quoting: quoting does not make the information or argument more credible as evidence or more comprehensible or more clearly supportive of your point than paraphrasing. Too many paragraphs are jumbles of quotations all thrown together; when writers do this, they convey to the reader that they don't actually know what they want to show.
PRINCIPLE 2:Never leave your reader in doubt as to when you are speaking and when you are using materials from a source. Avoid this ambiguity by citing the source immediately after using it, but also (especially when quoting directly) by announcing the source in your own sentence or phrases preceding its appearance and by following up its appearance with commentary about it or development from it that makes clear where your contribution starts.
PRINCIPLE 3:Always make clear how each source you use relates to the point you are making in your paragraph. This means indicating to your reader, in the words leading up to a source's appearance or in the sentences that follow and reflect on it (or in both), what you want your reader to notice or focus on in the source.
How Should I Incorporate the Source Information?
Signal that a quote or paraphrase is coming – and perhaps indicate your purpose in using it. Introducing quotes demonstrates that you understand why the quote is there, and that the quote is serving your purpose. Patching it in the middle of a paragraph makes the reader confused and encourages them to think that you just threw it in there because you didn't know what else to do.
Example: One form of social control in the workplace that helps to influence a woman's involvement in a nontraditional role is sexual harassment. "Women in male-dominated occupations report more harassment than women in sex-neutral or female-dominated occupations" (Jacobs 1989, 151).
Rewritten with signal that the author is a believable source: One form of social control in the workplace that helps to influence a woman's involvement in a nontraditional role is sexual harassment. As Jerry Jacobs, a leading scholar of occupational sex segregation, notes. women in "male-dominated occupations report more harassment than women in sex-neutral or female-dominated organizations" (Jacobs 1989, 151). (signal that the author is a believable source)
Other ways to introduce the quote:
1) signal that the information comes from a study -- In a study of women in male-dominated occupations, Jacobs found that ....
2) signal the source of the information – In a New York Times’ article on ….
Source: Harvey, G. (1995) Writing with sources: A guide for Harvard students.
Munkres, S. Writing workshop: Citing and quoting in sociological writing. Retrieved October 21, 2008. Writing Across the Curriculum; University of Wisconsin – Madison.