QUOTING FROM SOURCES: Essential Guidelines #1
The quoted material should be exactly the same as the original. This includes spelling,
capitalization, and most punctuation. Proofread your quotes for accuracy.
Notice the difference between the small hypen, (-) and the double hypen or en-dash (–).
The small hyphen is used to connect words into compounds (first-year student).
The en-dash is used to separate elements of sentences – it stands in for a semi-colon.
Choose the right one.
Regarding punctuation in quotations, there are some changes to original.
Quotes within quotes: when your quote includes a quote in the original, the
double quotes in the original change to single quotes in your version.
“Ken thought about it, but just for a second, and said (with studied,
minimal affect), ‘I just wanna be average.’ That woke me up” (Rose 28).
On short quotes (up to forty words, or four lines of text), the final period is
omitted from the quote itself, and appears only after the citation. On seminar
papers, use this style for long quotes as well. (There’s another rule for long
quotes in essays, which we’ll talk about.)
“It was a year of casting about” (Rose 79).
If you want to leave something out of a long quote, use an ellipses (…) to show
where you made the cut. Stay in the same paragraph – if you want to quote from
two paragraphs, use two separate quotations Be sure that what’s left makes sense
to the reader – don’t cut essential information.
“For Bobby, and for lots of other freshman…history is a chronicle.
History is dates and facts: Who invaded whom? When? With how many
men? And Bobby could memorize this sort of thing like a demon. But
social history, the history of moods and movements and ordinary people’s
lives, left Bobby without a clue…Social history was as unfamiliar to him
as a Bahamian folktale” (Rose 4).
The first time you cite an author’s name in a seminar paper or essay, use their whole
name (Mike Rose). After that, use only the last name (Rose). Generally names are
capitalized, but we’ll read a work soon by bell hooks, who does not capitalize her name.
(More on handling that when we get to her.)