Quotation, Paraphrase, or Summary?

Note: All three must be cited.

Direct Quotations

Use if you wish to

• present language that could not be effectively paraphrased or summarized.

• include wording that is particularly significant or unusual.

Do not overuse direct quotations: most of your paper should be written in your own words. If you use direct quotations, you must replicate the source’s words and punctuation exactly. Periods and commas always go inside the quotation marks (because American printers have decided it looks better that way) unless the sentence concludes with a citation.

              My sister whispered, “Let’s have tea.”

             “Let’s have tea,” my sister whispered.

             Cathy considers Hareton boorish due to his “drinking . . . tea out of a basin” (Brontë 9).

Other punctuation marks (; ! ?) go inside the quotation marks if part of the quotation, outside if they are punctuation in your own sentence.

           Did my sister whisper “Let’s have tea”?

Paraphrase

Paraphrase to clarify a source’s idea rather than to replicate a source’s language. A paraphrase is therefore not necessarily shorter than the source text.

When paraphrasing, you must recast the source’s ideas into your own words using your own sentence structure.

Summary

Summarize to condense a source’s ideas rather than to replicate a source’s language. A summary is shorter than the source text.

Again, when summarizing, you must recast the source’s ideas into your own words using your own sentence structure.