In-text Citation

1) An in-text citation is where the writer offers evidence for her/his ideas by providing a quotation, paraphrase,
or summary from another source.

2) In-text citations must be followed by parentheses that include the author’s last name, title of work, and page
numbers of the passage being cited (unless it’s an electronic source, in which case you don’t have page
numbers). If any of this information is provided in the text, it does not have to be repeated in the parentheses.

I. Quotation
A quotation is material taken verbatim from another text. Quotations can be in-text or indented (hit enter and tab over
once to start the quotation).

A. In-text Quotation
Use the style for in-text citations if the quote is no more than four lines (for prose) or three lines (for poetry).

Example:
The poet John Keats espoused a theory of negative capability in a letter to his brothers. He defined it as a state
where “man is capable of being in uncertainties, Mysteries, doubts, without any irritable reaching after fact &
reason” (“To George and Thomas Keats” 637).

The parenthetical citation comes AFTER the quotation, but BEFORE the final punctuation. Notice that I left out
the author’s last name from the parenthetical citation because it was already given in the text.

B. Indented Quotation
Use the style for indented quotations if the quote is MORE than four lines (for prose) or three lines (for poetry).

Example:
In the “Preface” to the Lyrical Ballads, William Wordsworth revolutionized what it meant to be a poet:
He is a man speaking to men: a man, it is true, endowed with more lively sensibility, more enthusiasm and
tenderness, who has a greater knowledge of human nature, and a more comprehensive soul, than are
supposed to be common among mankind; a man pleased with his own passions and volitions, and who
rejoices more than other men in the spirit of life that is in him: delighting to contemplate similar volitions
and passions as manifested in the goings-on of the Universe, and habitually impelled to create them where
he does not find them. (“Preface” 100)

Because the prose quotation is longer than four lines, one must indent the whole quotation once. Indentation
replaces the quotation marks (notice there are none). Also, for indented quotations, the parenthetical citation comes
AFTER the final punctuation.

II. Paraphrase
In general, you should paraphrase (put into your own words) information if a direct quotation is unnecessary or less
efficient. Paraphrased information is never placed within quotation marks and is never indented.

Example:
In a letter to his brothers, Keats noted that one could attain negative capability by suppressing the desire to make sense
out of the various mysteries that present themselves to one throughout the course of a lifetime (“To George and Thomas
Keats” 637).

III. Summary
For a summary, follow the same rules as paraphrasing. Summarizing is the process of condensing the MEANING of a
large body of text into a few words.

Example:
Wordsworth believed that the poet was a person who wrote poetry for the common man, but possessed greater
sensibility than the average person (“Preface” 100).