There are many different types of evidence to include in your writing, but the one I'll be focusing on today is arguably the most common: quotes. Quotes are excerpts from other people that help fortify your own points and arguments. They strengthen your argument because they show that other people share your opinion, and you'll often find facts and statistics with results that assist in proving your point.
But it can be tricky to know how to do quotes right. Here are some quick tips:
1. Look for credible sources to pull from
Your quotes won't serve as good evidence if they come from sketchy sources. Books in your school's library will be credible, and newspapers are good to pull from. Most of us, however, look for sources online. Sources that have a .org or .edu are a good indication of credibility. Online scholarly journals and reputable newspapers are also good. Try to see if you can identify an author. If there's no author attached to the article, better to skip it and find one that has an author listed. Avoid websites with crazy weird colors and trippy fonts. If it looks unprofessional, it probably is. Also, websites like Wikipedia are not great because just about anyone can get on there and make edits.
2. Use quotes that add substance
A quote isn't good evidence if it doesn't actually say anything. "Smoking is bad" isn't a substantial quote. It's general and obvious. "Smoking causes bad breath, yellowing teeth, and leads to lung cancer" is a quote that actually brings up some points worth noting. It's specific and informative.
3. Watch for quote length
Don't use quotes that are too long or too short. Too long, and we'll wonder why we're reading your essay instead of theirs. Too short, and it likely won't have any substance.
4. Don't leave the quote alone
Quotes are needy, and can't be left alone. They like to be introduced, and they really like commentary. An introduction looks like this: Dr. Frank Alley of Clock magazine wrote, "Smoking causes bad breath, yellowing teeth, and leads to lung cancer."
Commentary looks something like this: Basically, Dr. Alley is saying that smoking causes health and hygiene problems. Don't let the quote have the last word, add onto it. Tell us what you wanted us to get out of the quote. Here are a few sentence frames to help with commentary:
- In other words, ________________________________________________
- What ___________ really means by this is ______________________
- To put it another way, ______________________________________
- In sum, then, ______________________________________________
- In short, ______________________________________________________
- Basically, ________ is saying ___________________________
- In other words, ________ believes _________________________
- In making this comment, ____________ urges us to ____________
- ______’s point is that ________________________________
- The essence of _________’s argument is that __________________
Having good commentary will take your writing to the next level.
5. Cite your sources
This is the most important because you don't want to accidentally plagiarize. Make sure that you do the correct in-text citations and a works cited page. Owl at Purdue is a great resource for the different styles of citations:
MLA
APA
Chicago
6. Quotation marks
Whatever you do, don't forget to put the quotation marks around the quote. Believe it or not, I had students do this all the time, and it makes it look like you're plagiarizing.
And there you have it. Easy. If you follow these 6 steps for inserting quotes as evidence, you will be good to go.
Until next time, I remain your tired (my baby woke up early today) Online Writing Tutor,
Mrs. B
My students are always struggling with introducing quotes. This is great!
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