ETI 309—Introduction to Contemporary Western Literature

Writing Literary Analysis II: Documenting Sources in APA Format

Basic Conventions Using the ideas of others for support or clarification of your own

ideas is a legitimate practice in academic writing. You can do this through paraphrasing, summarizing, and quoting from sources.

Paraphrasing means rewriting parts of the original text in your own words in order to make them fit better with your own writing. A good paraphrase should be an accurate, thorough restatement of the original text in your own words.

You can paraphrase by changing the grammatical structures of sentences (changing the voice, sentence structure, etc.) and/or by replacing some words with others that have similar meanings (using synonyms, alternative word forms, etc.)

Basic Conventions Original:

“Although the artist encountered many difficulties in his life, he became extremely well known and successful.”

Possible paraphrases:

The painter was a popular success despite experiencing many problems during his lifetime.

The artist had many problems during his lifetime; nonetheless, he experienced considerable recognition and success.

Although he had experienced many hardships, the artist had a successful and distinguished career.

The painter achieved fame and success, his many problems notwithstanding.

Basic Conventions Summarizing: A summary is a general restatement of the main idea

of a passage in your own words. It highlights the major points and tries to give the essence of a source in as few words as possible.

In other words, summarizing gives the “gist” of a chosen passage, using your own words and not the author’s.

A summary is similar to a paraphrase except that a summary is shorter. When you summarize, you compress or condense large amounts of

information into the fewest possible sentences. In order to do this, you include only the main points and main supporting

points, leaving out the details. However, just as when you paraphrase, you must not change the

meaning of the original.

Original text“Since the time of Descartes, it is estimated that no fewer than five hundred attempts have been made to create artificial languages for international use. The most successful by far has been Esperanto, a language constructed around the end of the nineteenth century by Dr. Zamenhof of Poland. Esperanto is a language that is extremely easy to learn and speak, with its words drawn mainly from English, German, the Romance languages, Latin and Greek.”

Paraphrased textSince the era of Descartes, approximately five hundred artificial languages have been created for international communication. Esperanto, a language invented around the end of the nineteenth century in Poland by a man named Dr. Zamenhof, has been the most successful. Esperanto is very easy to learn and speak. Its vocabulary comes mainly from English, German, the Romance languages, Latin and Greek.

Summarized textRoughly five hundred attempts have been made to create artificial languages since Descartes. Esperanto, the most successful, was devised by Dr. Zamenhof of Poland; which is very easy to learn and speak.

Basic Conventions Quoting: If you use more than three contiguous words from

another author, you need to use quotation marks.

Quoted material should be used sparingly (max. of 10% of your paper should be devoted to quotations). They should be used to support a point you are making, not to fill up space!

Don't simply drop quotations into your paper and leave it to the reader to make connections. Let the reader know why you’re offerening the quotation (spend as much space setting up a quotation as the length of the quotation itself). Integrating a quotation into your text usually involves two elements: A signal that a quotation is coming—generally the author's name

and/or a reference to the work. An assertion that indicates the relationship of the quotation to your

text.

Basic Conventions

Incorporate short direct prose quotations into the text of your paper and enclose them in double quotation marks: According to Jonathan Clarke, "Professional diplomats often say

that trying to think diplomatically about foreign policy is a waste of time."

Begin longer quotations (in the APA format, 40 words/five lines or more) on a new line and indent the entire quotation (i.e. put in block form), with no quotation marks at beginning or end.

Basic Conventions When you are quoting only a portion of the whole, use ellipsis points

(. . .) to indicate an omission within a quotation.

When you are adding clarification, comment, or correction within quotations, use square brackets [ ] to add your own clarification, comment, or correction.

Quotations must be exactly as the authors produced them. Any author misspellings should be followed by [sic] (meaning "so" or "thus") to indicate that a mistake is in the source you’re quoting and is not your own.

When you paraphrase, summarize, and quote, you must be careful to provide proper credit in order to avoid plagiarism.

Basic Conventions Plagiarism: When ideas from others are used, the source of these

ideas should cited in your writing. If you present others’ ideas as your own, you plagiarize, which is a serious academic offense.

All of the following are considered plagiarism: turning in someone else’s work as your own, copying words or ideas from someone else without giving credit, failing to put a quotation in quotation marks, giving incorrect information about the source of a quotation, changing words but copying the sentence structure of a source without

giving credit, copying so many words or ideas from a source that it makes up the

majority of your work, whether you give credit or not.

Synthesizing Synthesis: Seeing the differences and similarities among sources,

forging relationships for your own purpose.

When you synthesize, you infer connections between one writer’s ideas and another’s. You then use these connections to support your own ideas. Once you finish, you create something different from what you started with: you create new knowledge

Your ability to write syntheses depends on your ability to infer relationships among sources—essays, articles, fiction, and also non-written sources such as lectures, interviews, observations.

In an academic synthesis, you need to display the relationships that you have inferred among separate sources and incorporate these sources into your documented essays.

Documenting Sources In writing a research paper, you use information and ideas from

other sources. Whenever you directly quote, summarize, or paraphrase another person's thoughts and ideas, or use facts and statistics that are not commonly known or believed, you must properly acknowledge your source.

There are different documentation styles such as MLA (Modern Language Association), APA (American Psychological Association) to cite your sources.

The APA style is the one commonly used in social sciences.

In the APA documentation style, parenthetical citations within the text refer the reader to a list of sources at the end of the text (References).

In-text Citations1. Author not named in your text

 

One critic of Milgram’s experiments insisted that the subjects “should have been fully informed of the possible effects on them” (Baumrind, 1988, p.34).

2. Author named in your text

Give the year of publication in parentheses immediately after the author's name.

Milstein (1990) believes that such animals as the grizzly bear, Dall sheep and golden eagle are in danger if measures are not taken to prevent poaching in our national parks (p. 49).

In-text Citations3. A work with two authors

When given in the text, two authors' names connected by and. In a parenthetical citation, they are connected by an ampersand (&).

According to Blumberg and Gottlieb (1989), the resurgence of recycling in the 1980’s can be traced to the confrontations between incineration and landfill projects.

The resurgence of recycling in the 1980’s can be traced to the confrontations between incineration and landfill projects (Blumberg & Gottlieb, 1989).

In-text Citations4. A work with three to five authors

Give all authors' last names in a signal phrase or parentheses in your first citation only; use an ampersand (&) instead of and in the parenthetical citation.

Clark, Escholz, and Rosa (1994) claim that liberation begins with the awareness that we all are to some degree prisoners of our language.

Liberation begins with the awareness that we all are to some degree prisoners of our language (Clark, Escholz, & Rosa, 1994).

In subsequent citations, use only the first author's name-and et al. (Latin for “and others”).

Clark et al. (1994) maintain that language is one of humankind's greatest achievements and most important resources.

In-text Citations5. Electronic sources

If possible, cite an electronic document the same as any other document by using the author-date style.

Kenneth (2000) explained...

Unknown Author and Unknown Date: If no author or date is given, use the title in your signal phrase or the first word or two of the title in the parentheses and use the abbreviation "n.d." (for "no date").

Another study of students and research decisions discovered that students succeeded with tutoring ("Tutoring Success," n.d.).

References1. A book with one author

Katznelson, I. (1992). Marxism and the city. New York: Oxford University Press.  

2. A book with two or more authors

Davison, J., & Davison, L. (1994). To make a house a home: Four generations of American women and the houses they lived in. New York: Random House.

3. A book with an editor

Cohen, C. B. (Ed.). (1988). Casebook on the termination of life sustaining treatment and care of the dying. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press.

4. A book with an edition other than first

Polsby, N. W., & Wildavsky, A. (1991). Presidential elections: Contemporary strategies of American electoral politics (2nd ed.). New York: Free Press.

References5. Two or more works by the same author

When listing two or more works by the same author, arrange them chronologically by year of publication, starting with the one published earliest. Repeat the author's name including any initials for all entries. If two or more works by the same author were published in the same year, use lowercase letters to differentiate them: (1992a), (1992b), and (1992c).

Sheely, G. (1988). Character: America's search for leadership. New York: William Morrow.

Sheely, G. (1992a). The silent passage: Menopause. New York: Random House.

Sheely, G. (1992b). Passages 2000: The revolution of second adulthood. New York: Random

House.

References6. Article in a magazine

Como, J. (1995, April 17). Hero storyteller. National Review, 47-53.

7. An article in a newspaper

Haveman, J. (1995, April 20). Indian tribes resist idea of state grants. The Washington Post, pp. B1, B6

In listing electronic sources in references, your goal is to both credit the author and enable a reader to retrieve the source, which means you need to include a complete retrieval path.

8. An article in an online journalWissink, J. A. (2004). Techniques of smoking cessation among teens and adults. Adolescent Medicine, 2. Retrieved August 16, 2005, from http://www.easu.edu/AdolescentMedicine/2-Wissink.html

References9. A journal article retrieved from an electronic database

Wilkins, J. M. (1999). The myths of the only child. Psychology Update, 11(1), 16-23. Retrieved December 20, 2005, from ProQuest Direct Database.

10. An independent document on the Web

Anderson, D. (2005, May 1). Social construction. Retrieved August 6, 2005, from http://www.sites.unc.edu/~daniel/social_construction

Revising your draft

First, read your paper for any content errors.

Checklist for content

1. Is my thesis statement concise and clear?

2. Did I follow my outline? Did I miss anything?

3. Are my arguments presented in a logical sequence?

4. Are all sources properly cited to ensure that I am not plagiarizing?

5. Have I proved my thesis with strong supporting arguments?

6. Have I made my intentions and points clear in the essay?

7. Did I leave a sense of completion for my reader(s) at the end of the paper?

Revising your draftChecklist for mechanics

1. Did I begin each paragraph with a proper topic sentence?

2. Have I supported my arguments with documented proof or examples?

3. Any run-on or unfinished sentences?

4. Any unnecessary or repetitious words?

5. Varying lengths of sentences?

6. Does one paragraph or idea flow smoothly into the next?

7. Any spelling or grammatical errors?

8. Quotes accurate in source, spelling, and punctuation?

9. Are all my citations accurate and in correct format?

10. Did I avoid using contractions? Use "cannot" instead of "can't", "do not" instead of "don't"?

11. Did I avoid using phrases such as "I think", "I guess", "I suppose"