When to Quote
Some instructors may ask that you avoid using quotations from secondary sources (i.e. scholarly works that comment on historical events) altogether, unless you need to comment on an author's exact words. Quotations from primary sources (i.e. original, first-hand accounts of those events) are more accepted since they serve as direct evidence of your assertions. Nonetheless, as a general rule, quote sparingly. Use only a few quotations in your essay and choose them carefully. If your quotations are to be effective, they must be an integral part of your essay. Resist the temptation to throw in a quotation merely because it sounds impressive and has something to do with your subject. Have a reason for using a quotation. Use the following guidelines on when to quote:
- when the writer's style or eloquence is so memorable that summarizing or paraphrasing would be significantly less effective. For example, Winston Churchill's World War II speech, "We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets..."1
- when you want to comment on, agree with, disagree with or otherwise take exception to what the writer has said
- when you want to comment specifically on the writer's use of words
The shorter your quotations are, the better. In a short essay in particular, you should avoid quoting huge chunks of text. The ideal quotation is often just a few words integrated into your own sentences.
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1. Winston Churchill, Blood, Sweat, and Tears (New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1941), 297.
Integrating Quotations
If quotations are to be effective in your writing, they must be carefully worked into your own sentences and paragraphs. Quotations must be introduced, commented on and related to the main ideas of the paragraphs in which you have placed them. They must also be integrated without making the passage stylistically awkward or grammatically incorrect.
Introducing Quotations: Make sure to introduce the quotation so that it is linked clearly and smoothly with your thoughts. Vary the way in which you introduce quotations with phrases such as "according to," "in the opinion of," "as X argues (or believes, admits, affirms, declares, suggests, etc.)." These are known as attributory words.
Explaining Quotations: After the quotation, make sure that you supply any needed explanations of or comments on the quotation. Do not assume the reader will interpret the quotation exactly as you do.
Long and Short Quotations
Short Quotations: Quotations of four typed lines or fewer are usually incorporated into the text of the essay and are enclosed within quotation marks. For poetry or song lyrics, incorporate quotations of two lines or less directly into the text, separating each line by a forward slash ( / ) with a space on either side of it.
Long Quotations: Use longer quotations sparingly. You can often make your point better with a short selection than with a longer one. However, long quotations are sometimes necessary to preserve accuracy and completeness of meaning. Indent every line of a long quotation and double space throughout. In long quotations, quotation marks are not used unless they appear within the text of the quoted material.
Accurate Quoting
Ensure that the quotation corresponds exactly with the wording, spelling, and punctuation of the original; any changes that you make in the quotation must be indicated using the following methods:
- Ellipsis: Use ellipsis dots wherever you omit material from what you are quoting, except when omission comes at the beginning or end of a quotation. E.g. "Why are parents to lose their children, brothers their sisters, or husbands their wives? Surely, this is a new refinement in cruelty... and adds fresh horrors even to the wretchedness of slavery."1
- Square Brackets: Use square brackets if you wish to insert in the quotation a word or more of explanation. E.g. "I was now persuaded that I had gotten into a world of bad spirits, and that [the ship's crew] were going to kill me."2
- Capitals: Because a quotation should fit into your sentence or paragraph as an integral part of your language and meaning, it is sometimes necessary to change a capital letter (one beginning a sentence in the quoted source, for example) to a lower-case letter. Square brackets are used to make this change. E.g. According to Equiano, "[t]he closeness of the place, and the heat of the climate, added to the number in the ship... almost suffocated us."3
- Sic: If you wish to indicate that your quotation is accurate even though the passage's spelling, language or logic is faulty, place the word sic in square brackets following the error.
Note: When altering a quotation, especially when omitting portions of a quotation, it is very important to ensure that your changes don't affect the meaning intended by the author.
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1. Olaudah Equiano, "Excerpt from The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano," in The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, Robert J. Allison, ed. (Boston: Bedford / St. Martin's, 1995), 58.
2. Equiano, 53.
Punctuating Quotations
If you work the quotation into the structure of your sentence, no introductory or additional punctuation is necessary. E.g. While it is true women did not often fight, the crusade was "the most urgent situation in all Christendom."1
Attributory words: If you use attributory words, use commas to set off these words, whether they appear before, after, or between parts of the quotation. E.g."[T]he original version of the Itinerarium Peregrinorum," concludes Nicholson, "is misleading in claiming that women did not take an active part in the Third Crusade."1
Independent Clauses: If you precede your quotation with an independent clause, use a colon to introduce the quotation. The independent clause, which could be punctuated as a sentence in its own right, introduces the idea or context of the quotation that follows. E.g. Muslim accounts of women going into battle dressed as men must be taken cautiously: "It seems far less likely that noblewomen dressed up as men and fought on the battlefield on horseback, still less that they led their troops into battle; such actions would be more likely to attract comment."1
Closing punctuation: Periods or commas at the close of a quotation are placed before the quotation marks. Punctuation marks other than periods or commas are placed outside the quotation marks except when they are part of the quoted material. The number for your footnote or endnote goes last. E.g. Were accounts of women fighting left out of the IP1 because they "would only make a bad defeat look worse"?1
Quotations within quotations: Use single quotation marks if you have already used double marks around the entire passage. In other words, when quoting a sentence that contains quotation marks already, place double marks around all the words you are quoting and turn the double quotation marks of the original into single marks. E.g. Nicholson observes how one Muslim accounts feminizes Christian castles, noting how in the account, "[t]he Hospitaller's castle of Kaukab was 'an inviolable woman, a maid who could not be asked for in marriage'; the captured castle of ash-Shughr was 'a virgin fortress taken by force.'"2
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1. Helen Nicholson, "Women on the Third Crusade," Journal of Medieval History 23, no. 4 (1997): 349.
2. Nicholson, 341.