Quoting
You quote when you need the exact language rather than just the idea of a passage (see the next chapter for a bit more on making this choice). Quoting seems easy, but there are some rules and guidelines that you need follow. Failure to follow them can land you in plagiarism trouble.
Understanding the Rules and Guidelines for Quoting
These should help you as you quote.
Quote Exactly
Quotations must be exact. When your reader sees quotation marks, they are assuming that everything between the quotation marks is exactly what is in the original. This means that you can’t change anything in the text between your quotation marks, except what’s explained in the section below on altering quotations.
Quote Minimally
You should only quote the parts of a sentence that you absolutely need to make your point. Sometimes you need an entire sentence, but more often, you really only need to quote a few words, and the rest of the sentence could be paraphrased. Don’t quote more than you need.
Connect Quotations to Your Own Sentences
If you stick a quotation into a paragraph without connecting it to one of your own sentences, you have what’s called a “dropped quotation.” Dropped quotations confuse your reader. Without some connection to what you are saying, your reader doesn’t know why this source has suddenly appeared in your paragraph. Even when you need to quote an entire sentence, be sure to begin with something like the following:
Smith claims that “[insert quotation here].”
As Jones makes clear, “[insert quotation here].”
Even better, though, would be to paraphrase and include a minimal quotation if at all possible:
Smith claims that all students would do better in school if “[insert quotation here].”
As Jones makes clear, students who “[insert quotation here]” do far better academically than those who don’t.
Altering Quotations
There are three changes that you can make to the words between sets of quotation marks. Only three.
Using an Ellipsis (…)
An ellipsis is three periods in a row. Informally, we use ellipses (the plural form) to indicate that an idea is unfinished or that the next statement is so obvious that the reader can fill it in. But ellipses indicate something different when they appear in a quotation. Ellipses tell your reader that something has been left out.
Note that you must not change the meaning of a quotation by leaving out something relevant. This is called taking a quotation out of context. For example, you cannot remove a “not” in a sentence to change the meaning. This would obviously alter the author’s meaning.
An ellipsis is only three dots. When you see four dots, you are really seeing an ellipsis and a period. Some style guides require you to put a space between each dot; others require you to keep the dots together but put spaces on either side of the set, just as you would a word (except when there’s another mark of punctuation, in which case, there usually isn’t a space). If you aren’t sure, ask your professor.
Ellipses c