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In-Text Citation | Work Cited | Punctuation When Citing Sources

Sigh.

It's always always a bit of a drudge citing sources. 

Let's just get right to it so that you can get back to reading and thinking and writing. 

A quick head's up on formatting conventions: "Quotes Are Used for Short Story Titles (and Poems and Essays)."  Italics are Used for Titles of Books, Newspapers, Magazines. 

In-Text Citation

For in-text citations, the convention is that you just include the page number for your primary source -- it's assumed that you've identified the primary source in the introduction.  If there's any chance of confusion, include the author's name in a phrase before the quote itself.

Voltaire shows how the world has tainted Candide good nature through his marriage to Cunegonde. It is not love that moves him "But the extreme impertinence of the Baron [which] determined him to conclude the match" (84). No longer acing on his best impulses, Candide, like many others, is moved by spite -- even for something as solemn as marriage.

The square brackets ([d]) alert the reader that you, the writer, have added something to the quote.

As she and her mother are removing furniture from Gregor's room, Grete's hostility to her brother is revealed. After his mother faints from the sight of him on the wall, Grete cries "'You, Gregor!' [. . . ] with a raised fist" (34). The "fist" -- a recurring symbol of domination in the novel, illustrates how Grete has changed from caretaker to authoritarian, a step along her own transformation to a final renunciation of Gregor's humanity.

Note that the quotation marks in the original primary source were changed to single quotes.

Work Cited

The work cited entry for the Candide quote above would read as follows:

Voltaire is usually cited with his one word pen name. The translator is anonymous, so she/he doesn't have to be noted.

For The Metamorphosis quote, it would read as follows:

Translator is listed here -- and note hanging indent, italics, etc.  

For more information on citation with many more examples, see the Perdue OWL citing sources link.

 Punctuation with Citations

Use the following examples (using Tim O'Brien's Things They Carried as a primary source) to guide your use of punctuation when citing sources.

For basic punctuation: note placement of period and that author's name isn't needed for primary sources (you've already mentioned it in the intro).

"Henry Dobbins made the washing motion with his hands" (117).

 For question marks and exclamation, period at the end.

"Treat them decent, you know?" (117).

Quote illustrating set up/introduction/context

Dobbins, in the chapter "Church," shows how people can forget they are in war. Discussing his religious views with Kiowa, he says "I do like churches. The way it feels inside. It feels good when you just sit there, like you're in a forest and everything's really quiet, except there's still this sound you can't hear" (116).

Quote illustrating deletion of a sentence -- note brackets and four ellipsis dots

Dobbins, in the chapter "Church," shows how people can forget they are in war. Discussing his religious views with Kiowa, he says "I do like churches [ . . . . ] It feels good when you just sit there, like you're in a forest and everything's really quiet, except there's still this sound you can't hear" (116).

Quote illustrating deletion of a phrase -- note brackets and three ellipsis dots

Dobbins, in the chapter "Church," shows how people can forget they are in war. Discussing his religious views with Kiowa, he says "I do like churches. The way it feels inside. It feels good [ . . . ] like you're in a forest and everything's really quiet, except there's still this sound you can't hear" (116).

Quote illustrating separating quote into parts with a phrase

Dobbins, in the chapter "Church," shows how people can forget they are in war. Discussing his religious views with Kiowa, he says "I do like churches" (116). After this bland statement, he goes more into the emotions, removing himself from the jungles of Vietnam back to an idealized church in America: "It feels good when you just sit there, like you're in a forest and everything's really quiet, except there's still this sound you can't hear" (116).

Quote illustrating separating quote into parts with just a word or two.

Dobbins, in the chapter "Church," shows how people can forget they are in war. Discussing his religious views with Kiowa, he says "I do like churches" (116). He adds "It feels good when you just sit there, like you're in a forest and everything's really quiet, except there's still this sound you can't hear" (116).

Changing cases or tense in a quote

" _____ run _____"

"_____ [ran] _____"

"_____ love _____"

"_____ lov[ed] _____"

© 2017 David Bordelon