notesincorporatingmaterial

INCORPORATING THE IDEAS OF OTHERS AND USING A NEUTRAL, UNBIASED VOICE

Remember in this assignment that you are just reporting the ideas of others and not directly inserting your own opinions.

In this essay, direct quotes should account for 20% of your paper’s content, while the other 80% should be your own academic voice (the use of formal language and tone, no contractions, and no use of first person, “I”).

You might wonder how you are to achieve this goal when you are not to include your own ideas. Often, students conclude that if this “80%” is to be their own voice, then it should be their own ideas as well. This is an incorrect assumption.

What you have to do is incorporate the ideas of others by summarizing (paraphrasing) what the source said and follow the other steps below to ensure that you are giving credit to the appropriate source and not plagiarizing.

For example, the first time you use a source, you should introduce it. John Smith, professor of psychiatry at Harvard University states in his article, "Media Violence," that "violence in video games causes an increase of aggression in children" (Insert appropriate MLA citation).

Remember to follow every direct quote with the appropriate MLA citation.

To insert your academic voice here, perhaps in the next 5 sentences or so, summarize Smith's other points related to the direct quote above.

Smith relates that parents are concerned about the growing number of video games with violent content that are directly marketed to children. He points out that they are advertised during popular Saturday morning cartoons, despite the fact that these games are often rated "M" for mature and can only be directly sold to individuals over the age of 18. Smith argues that video game makers should not be allowed to advertise games with adult content on television during times and programs that are known to have large numbers of young viewers (insert appropriate MLA citation for the paraphrase). Note the phrases in italics above. These are known as author tags and alert your reader that these ideas belong to the source, and not you, the writer.

After the paraphrase, you should then explain the importance of your direct quote and paraphrased material. In other words, why is the information important? Why are you showing it to your reader? How is it related to the other information you have shown and will also show in later portions of your paper? Here's an example below:

Many agree with Smith that it is reprehensible for games makers and advertisers to target young children in this manner, however, others point out that ultimately it is the parent's responsibility to monitor what their children are watching on television and the video games they are purchasing and playing. Note the phrases in italics above as well. These are known as qualifiers, which are used to alert your reader that you are now using your own academic voice and that these ideas no longer are directly attributed to the source. These phrases show that you, the writer, are not biased in any way. In other words, you are merely reporting the facts and not personally siding with one side of the argument or another.

Here’s how the above material would appear in a single paragraph:

John Smith, professor of psychiatry at Harvard University states in his article, "Media Violence," that "violence in video games causes an increase of aggression in children" (Insert appropriate MLA citation). Smith relates that parents are concerned about the growing number of video games with violent content that are directly marketed to children. He points out that they are advertised during popular Saturday morning cartoons, despite the fact that these games are often rated "M" for mature and can only be directly sold to individuals over the age of 18. Smith argues that video game makers should not be allowed to advertise games with adult content on television during times and programs that are known to have large numbers of young viewers (insert appropriate MLA citation for the paraphrase). Many agree with Smith that it is reprehensible for games makers and advertisers to target young children in this manner, however, others point out that ultimately it is the parent's responsibility to monitor what their children are watching on television and the video games they are purchasing and playing.

MLA IN-TEXT CITATIONS

Remember the rule that I mentioned to you in class. You must have an in-test MLA citation after every single direct quotation and at the end of a paraphrase.

In the following paragraphs, where should citations be placed?

In her article "Monet and Manet: Scenes from Daily Life," Mary Jones, Director of the Impressionists Collection at the Art Institute of Chicago, explains that "------------- quote here -----------------------." She points out ----------------------------------------------. She relates ------------------------------------------------. She argues -----------------------------------------------. Many art critics, however, disagree, claiming that --------------------------------------------------------------------------. Michael Lowrey, for example, argues -----------------------------------------------------------------------. He explains, " ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------." Many art historians concur, stating that Mary Jones simply doesn't understand Monet.

In this example, one need merely look for the author tags and qualifiers to understand where the MLA citations should be placed.

In sentence #1, the author of this paragraph introduces the source because this is the first time she has used it. You will also notice an author tag here ("Mary Jones explains") followed by a statement inside quotation marks, which signals a reader that this a a direct quote from Jones.

Assuming that the author of this paragraph used an html article from a library electronic database (not and Adobe .pdf file), the author would place a citation at the end of this sentence. It woud look like this "------------" (Jones). This would be cited because all direct quotes must have citations.

The next sentence begins, "She points out." There are no quotation marks, however, in this example above. Because there is an author tag, we know this information came from Jones' source. Because of the lack of quotation marks, however, this must be a paraphrase. (The author of this paragraph has taken ideas from Jones' source that belong to Jones and then placed them in their own words).

Remember that paraphrased material must be cited. However, the rule states that you must cite at the end of the paraphrase. Keep in mind that this may be more than one sentence. So, as long as the paraphrased material is coming from the same source, the citation is placed at the end of the paraphrased material, not at the end of each sentence of a paraphrase.

So, in the example above before determining if we must cite at the end of sentence #2, we must look at sentence #3 to determine if the paraphrase has continued or if it has ended.

How will we know? Look for an author tag.

Sentence #3 begins, "She relates." This is another paraphrase. Sentence #4 is also a paraphrase. How do you know? It also begins with an author tag, "She argues."

Does the paraphrase end there? Look at the next sentence. It begins, Many art critics, however, disagree." This is a qualifier (not an author tag), so the previous sentence that began "she argues" is the final sentence of that paraphrase, so the citation would be placed there (not at the end of each setence of the paraphrase).

The next sentence begins, "Michael Lowery, for example, argues." This author tag ("Lowrey argues") signals a new author/source. Because the source wasn't introduced here, we must assume that in the context of the larger paper, that the author had previously done so in an earlier paragraph.

Notice that there aren't any quotation marks. This means that this is a paraphrase (because of the author tag).

The next sentence begins, "He explains" and this has some quoted material after it. So, the previous sentence was the end of the paraphrase. Because of this a citation must be placed there. A citation must also be placed at the end of the sentence that begins "He explains" because this is a direct quote and all direct quotes must be cited.

The final sentence begins, "Many art historians concur." This is a qualifier. "Art historians" are a general group, not a specific person. This signals to the reader of this paragraph that this is the author of this paragraph is attempting to use a neutral, unbiased voice here and is using his academic voice to do so.

Had he written "Mary Jones simply doesn't understand Monet." The reader of the paragraph could have assumed that this was the opinion of the writer of the paragraph.

This is unacceptable in an informative academic paper. A statement like that would move the purpose of the paper from merely informing to arguing using personal opinion.

Notice that he also used a contraction. This is not acceptable in academic writing either because it is considered too informal.

The paragraph we just discussed would look like this with its citations.

In her article "Monet and Manet: Scenes from Daily Life," Mary Jones, Director of the Impressionists Collection at the Art Institute of Chicago, explains that "------------- quote here -----------------------" (Jones). She points out ----------------------------------------------. She relates ------------------------------------------------. She argues ----------------------------------------------- (Jones). Many art critics, however, disagree, claiming that --------------------------------------------------------------------------. Michael Lowrey, for example, argues ----------------------------------------------------------------------- (Lowrey). He explains, " ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------" (Lowrey). Many art historians concur, stating that Mary Jones simply doesn't understand Monet.

Had either source from Jones or Lowrey been an Adobe file article from a database (.pdf) or a hardcopy of a book or journal, etc., the writer of this paragraph would have also included a specific page number in his citation.

Example:

In this example, the quote was taken from the source writtten by Jones and could be found on page 5 of that source.

Indirect quotes

Please read carefully here. This can get confusing.

Rebecca Talent, a student at JWU is writing a research paper on Picasso's Blue Period. While searching Academic Search Premeir on the library's databases she locates an article written noted art historian, Devin Hart of Columbia University. Rebecca finds that this article contains a lot of good information, so she takes it home and reads it with a pen in her hand, underlining what she thinks are Hart's most important ideas.

As she does this, she comes across a quote that Hart provides from Juliana Huffington, an art historian at UCLA. She likes it and circles it and writes a note in the margin about how she thinks she might be able to use it later.

When Rebecca begins working on her first draft, she decides the quote is perfect for her paper and directly quotes Huffington.

She's confused. How does she cite this? Huffington made the statement, but she did not write the article. Devin Hart wrote it. What does she do?

This is the quote she uses from Huffington that was found in the source written by Hart:

Juliana Huffington explains, "Shortly after moving to Paris from Barcelona, Picasso began to produce works that were suffused in blue. This particular pigment is effective in conveying a sombre tone. The psychological trigger for these depressing paintings was the suicide of Picasso's friend Casagemas. The Blue Period work is quite sentimental, but we must keep in mind that Picasso was still in his late teens, away from home for the first time, and living in very poor conditions."

If she uses Huffington's name in the citation, it will look like Huffington wrote the article, which isn't true Hart did.

Juliana Huffington, art historian from UCLA, explains "The Blue Period work is quite sentimental, but we must keep in mind that Picasso was still in his late teens, away from home for the first time, and living in very poor conditions" (Huffington).

This wouldn't be correct either because Huffington said it, not Hart:

Juliana Huffington, art historian from UCLA, explains,"The Blue Period work is quite sentimental, but we must keep in mind that Picasso was still in his late teens, away from home for the first time, and living in very poor conditions" (Hart).

Rebecca is frustrated and doesn't know what to do!

When looking over her notes from class, she recalls what Professor Harmon said to do in a case like this.

This is an indirect quote. It would look like this:

The lowercase "'qtd.'in Hart" means quoted in Hart (Huffington is quoted in the source written by Hart).

Now after reading these examples, you are ready to try this on your own. Proceed to the Academic Voice and MLA Citation exercise.