Integrated Quotes: Citing Sources Effectively in MLA-Style Papers
The MLA-style in-text citation is highly compressed, designed to balance the flow of your own ideas with the precision of brief references.
Rather than interrupting your ideas with long chunks from other sources, prefer integrated quotations — short, meaningful quotes that work organically with the grammar of your original sentence, invoking outside evidence with power and precision. (See also: Academic Writing; Thesis Statements.)
One engineer who figures prominently in all accounts of the 1986 Challenger accident says NASA was “absolutely relentless and Machiavellian” (Vaughan 221) about following procedures to the letter.
This passage integrates a very brief quotation (just four words) into a sentence that helps the author make a point. MLA style uses just the author’s last name and the page number (or for a poem, line number) separated by a space—not a comma.
Diane Vaughan cites a shuttle engineer who says NASA was “absolutely relentless and Machiavellian” about following procedures to the letter (221).
In the above example (which is also acceptable), when your own sentence mentions the author, do not repeat the author in the parenthetical citation.
Diane Vaughan, a professor of psychology at Boston College and an expert in corporate reactions to emergencies, published an extensive study of the 1986 Challenger disaster, called The Challenger Launch Decision. In that book, on page 221, she cites a prominent shuttle engineer who says NASA was “absolutely relentless and Machiavellian” about following procedures to the letter.
DianeVaughan, a professor of psychology at Boston College and an expert in corporate reactions to emergencies, published an extensive study of the 1986 Challenger disaster, called The Challenger Launch Decision. In that book, on page 221, shecites a prominent shuttle engineer who says NASA was “absolutely relentless and Machiavellian” about following procedures to the letter.
In high school, you may have been rewarded for introducing every quote with a full sentence identifying the author and mentioning the author’s credentials. But as a college writing teacher, what I see is filler.
In The Challenger Launch Decision, by Diane Vaughan, it says that an engineer who figures prominently in all accounts of the disaster believes NASA was “absolutely relentless and Machiavellian” (Vaughan 221) about following procedures to the letter.
An MLA-style paper does not ask you to give the full name and credentials of your sources in the body of your paper, or even the full title of your source.
Integrate Brief Quotations from Outside Sources
If you bring your essay to a screeching halt in order to introduce the full name and credentials of each author, you will bury whatever argument you were trying to make.
Spot the Wordy Formula
Have you ever noticed how some people just won’t shut up? In the book Why I Love Words by humorist Ira Talott, a similar point is made on page 45: “The streets are full of people who talk to themselves, who write journal entries to nobody. Do they feel that speaking and writing is more important than listening and reading? These people are boring at parties, but are they arrogant? They are compulsive communicators. It’s more likely that they simply live in perpetual fear of silence.” This quote shows that people who talk too much may not actually be able to help themselves, so we should be kind to them.
The above example makes a very small point, quoting a much longer passage than necessary, and expending far too many words on the buildup.
Efficient Revision
Talott is sympathetic towards “compulsive communicators,” who are “boring at parties,” but who are not actually arrogant; instead, they “simply live in perpetual fear of silence” (45).
Which version do you think is better writing — the original (114 words) or the revision (27 words)?
Which version takes more skill to write?
Which would you rather read?
Three Potential Ways to Apply Borrowed Material
Talott is sympathetic towards “compulsive communicators,” who are “boring at parties” (45), but who are not actually arrogant. These people “live in perpetual fear of silence,” which makes them “especially susceptible to bottom-feeding advertising campaigns” (Jones 132) that prey upon low self-esteem and body image.
According to Kittler, the concept of the pen as a masculine symbol imposing form and order upon feminized, virginal paper was “an omnipresent metaphor” (186) in the days before the typewriter. But businesses were soon clamoring for the services of typists, who were mostly female. In fact, “typewriter” meant both the machine and the woman who used it (183).
The above revision mentions Kittler’s name in the body, and cites two different places in Kittler’s text using page numbers alone.
Integrated Quotes Facilitate Smarter Writing
Sweeping general statements, gradually working to a specific mention of topic X.
Summary of how Source A “talks about X.”
Summary of how Source B “talks about X.”
Summary of how Source C “talks about X.”
Conclusion: “Therefore, A, B, and C all relate to topic X.”
This structure won’t permit original connections. You will end up writing too much summary and not enough argument.
Introduction: Explain how source A, B, and C can’t all be right. Resolve the conflict.
Point 1: Present your answer, drawing on all 3 sources to support your position.
Conclusion: Discuss new insights available after resolving the problems.
Leslie, it’s great that your instructor is giving you the chance to revise. He or she is doing twice or three times the work it would take just to give you a single grade, and you will learn a lot if you take full advantage of the opportunity.
I’m looking at the author’s footnote, and it says “…STATISTICS”.
So I Google the article in the NYT by it’s title: “Belt-Loosening in the Work Force” (NYT 2 Mar 2003)
and the article’s author writes:
______________________________________
The economists — Shin-Yi Chou, Henry Saffer and Michael Grossman — presented their findings in a working paper called ”An Economic Analysis of Obesity” for the National Bureau of Economic Research. In the paper, the economists note that… ______________________________________
So I Google An Economic Analysis of Obesity and find it’s REALLY:
An Economic Analysis of Adult Obesity: Results from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System Shin-Yi Chou, Michael Grossman and Henry Saffer NBER Working Paper No. 9247 October 2002 JEL No. I12, I18
The mis-cited, mis-cited :) statement is on page 28:
“Without trend terms, the increase in the per capita number of restaurants makes the largest contribution to trends in weight outcomes, accounting for 69 percent of the growth in BMI and 68 percent of the rise in the percentage obese.” (Chou 28)
So, first, kudos to you!!! – for even taking the time to fact-check the quote… If it wasn’t for you, I’d have been wrong, and wronger :)
Second, now that I have the correct citation information, do I
a) cite Banzhaf only, and b) with a [sic]?
The reason I ask is… I learned from you, elsewhere on your site, that I should not quote from an “outside source”… If I quote Chou’s paper, I’m thinking that is considered an “outside source”?
Wow. You blow my doors off with your attention to detail. Excellent, sir. Pure excellence.
Your own detective work was pretty good, too! Most professional researchers will put this level of scrutiny into every source they plan to use in their papers, which is why it’s worth the effort for students to find and use peer-reviewed academic sources, rather than random web pages.
If you want to use that statistic, I wouldn’t cite Banzhaf at all — which looked like a random website, not a scholarly publication. Just cite the MBER paper directly.
I just wanted to catch up and say thanks for your help.
I was (and still am) under a ton of deadlines, so I wasn’t able to stop back here right away…
FYI: The Banzhaf essay in question is in a textbook called: “They Say/I Say”: The Moves That Matter in Academic Writing : With Readings. By Gerald Graff, Cathy Birkenstein, and Russel K. Durst. 1st ed. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2009. ISBN-13: 978-0393931747
The final was due within hours of my last post, so I had to make a corporate decision as to what(whom) I should cite…I picked Banzhaf. Citing him was easier than going with the MBER paper :)
I received a solid “B”. I kinda thought I was getting an A (hah! giggle…) When I read my professor’s critiques of my paper, however, she was deadly accurate as to what I needed to improve upon. It certainly was not an A paper, after all. So, I’ve got new goals for paper #2 :)
She made this very neat-o checklist of what constitutes A level work, B level work, C level work, etc… I’ll ask her permission to scan in and send to you…might be something cool to pass along.
An interesting anecdote: Discovering the mis-cited, mis-cited information in the Banzhaf essay/NYT article led me to my thesis topic for paper #2.
(I’m still trying to work out how I’m going to explain somewhere in that paper that ya’ got ta’ put da’ lime in de’ coconut… but it’ll come to me…)
Keep up the awesome work on helping all of us of out here in “the intertoobs” land… we, the unwashed masses of inept paper writers :) You rock!
How delightful to hear your update! If you are taking your learning this seriously, I don’t see how you can go wrong.
Hi.
I love your website! I’m in a college English Comp class and am working on a thesis paper.
(MLA format)
I’m quoting an author named John Banzhaf and have a question about how to cite the quote.
My author’s essay is actually a transcript of his Congressional testimony. He uses footnotes to provide references to validate his statements.
In one of his footnotes, he quotes an excerpt from an article in the New York Times.
I’ve quoted that same NYT excerpt.
How would I format the quote citation?
Do I cite the quote as coming from the author’s body of work, and not worry about it’s original source?
I’m thinking it should be: (I’ve included my own lead-in, for your to see what I’m trying to quote)
…it is one of these footnotes that refers us to a study done by the National Bureau of Economic Statistics and subsequently reported in the New York Times that the “growth of fast-food accounted for 68 percent of the rise in American obesity”. (Banzhaf 166)
I asked my professor, and she wasn’t sure. MLA’s website doesn’t provide specific formatting help (buy the book :) and Purdue doesn’t mention a quote within a quote…
Thank you for any help!!! You are an ENORMOUS help to us literary n00bs :)
You’re playing the telephone game — I am reading what you say Banzhaf said the New York Times said something called the “National Bureau of Economic Statistics” said.
I just did a Google search, and I found a US Bureau of Economic Analysis and National Bureau of Economic Research. I don’t know anything about economics, so I don’t know whether perhaps the same organization had a recent name change, but it looks to me like Google references to NBES are actually talking about the NBER instead. At any rate, that’s enough of a warning sign that I’d say the problem is not how to cite Banzhaf, but rather how to trace the 68% statistic directly to its source. (I’d start by looking for the NYT article that Banzhaf mentions.)
The MLA-style in-text citation is highly compressed, designed to balance the flow of your own ideas with the precision of brief references.
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great posting thanks a lot !!
still confused on how to insert things when needed and basically using it in general paper is due wednesday rough draft
Leslie, it’s great that your instructor is giving you the chance to revise. He or she is doing twice or three times the work it would take just to give you a single grade, and you will learn a lot if you take full advantage of the opportunity.
Dude!
You are bang on correct!
I’m looking at the author’s footnote, and it says “…STATISTICS”.
So I Google the article in the NYT by it’s title: “Belt-Loosening in the Work Force” (NYT 2 Mar 2003)
and the article’s author writes:
______________________________________
The economists — Shin-Yi Chou, Henry Saffer and Michael Grossman — presented their findings in a working paper called ”An Economic Analysis of Obesity” for the National Bureau of Economic Research. In the paper, the economists note that…
______________________________________
So I Google An Economic Analysis of Obesity and find it’s REALLY:
An Economic Analysis of Adult Obesity: Results from the Behavioral
Risk Factor Surveillance System
Shin-Yi Chou, Michael Grossman and Henry Saffer
NBER Working Paper No. 9247
October 2002
JEL No. I12, I18
The mis-cited, mis-cited :) statement is on page 28:
“Without trend terms, the increase in the per capita number of restaurants makes the
largest contribution to trends in weight outcomes, accounting for 69 percent of the growth in
BMI and 68 percent of the rise in the percentage obese.” (Chou 28)
So, first, kudos to you!!! – for even taking the time to fact-check the quote…
If it wasn’t for you, I’d have been wrong, and wronger :)
Second, now that I have the correct citation information, do I
a) cite Banzhaf only, and
b) with a [sic]?
The reason I ask is… I learned from you, elsewhere on your site, that I should not quote from an “outside source”…
If I quote Chou’s paper, I’m thinking that is considered an “outside source”?
Wow.
You blow my doors off with your attention to detail.
Excellent, sir.
Pure excellence.
~Kathy
Your own detective work was pretty good, too! Most professional researchers will put this level of scrutiny into every source they plan to use in their papers, which is why it’s worth the effort for students to find and use peer-reviewed academic sources, rather than random web pages.
If you want to use that statistic, I wouldn’t cite Banzhaf at all — which looked like a random website, not a scholarly publication. Just cite the MBER paper directly.
Hey!
I just wanted to catch up and say thanks for your help.
I was (and still am) under a ton of deadlines, so I wasn’t able to stop back here right away…
FYI: The Banzhaf essay in question is in a textbook called:
“They Say/I Say”: The Moves That Matter in Academic Writing : With Readings. By Gerald Graff, Cathy Birkenstein, and Russel K. Durst. 1st ed. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2009. ISBN-13: 978-0393931747
The final was due within hours of my last post, so I had to make a corporate decision as to what(whom) I should cite…I picked Banzhaf.
Citing him was easier than going with the MBER paper :)
I received a solid “B”.
I kinda thought I was getting an A (hah! giggle…)
When I read my professor’s critiques of my paper, however, she was deadly accurate as to what I needed to improve upon. It certainly was not an A paper, after all.
So, I’ve got new goals for paper #2 :)
She made this very neat-o checklist of what constitutes A level work, B level work, C level work, etc…
I’ll ask her permission to scan in and send to you…might be something cool to pass along.
An interesting anecdote:
Discovering the mis-cited, mis-cited information in the Banzhaf essay/NYT article led me to my thesis topic for paper #2.
(I’m still trying to work out how I’m going to explain somewhere in that paper that ya’ got ta’ put da’ lime in de’ coconut… but it’ll come to me…)
Keep up the awesome work on helping all of us of out here in “the intertoobs” land… we, the unwashed masses of inept paper writers :)
You rock!
~Kathy
How delightful to hear your update! If you are taking your learning this seriously, I don’t see how you can go wrong.
Hi.
I love your website!
I’m in a college English Comp class and am working on a thesis paper.
(MLA format)
I’m quoting an author named John Banzhaf and have a question about how to cite the quote.
My author’s essay is actually a transcript of his Congressional testimony.
He uses footnotes to provide references to validate his statements.
In one of his footnotes, he quotes an excerpt from an article in the New York Times.
I’ve quoted that same NYT excerpt.
How would I format the quote citation?
Do I cite the quote as coming from the author’s body of work, and not worry about it’s original source?
I’m thinking it should be:
(I’ve included my own lead-in, for your to see what I’m trying to quote)
…it is one of these footnotes that refers us to a study done by the National Bureau of Economic Statistics and subsequently reported in the New York Times that the “growth of fast-food accounted for 68 percent of the rise in American obesity”. (Banzhaf 166)
I asked my professor, and she wasn’t sure.
MLA’s website doesn’t provide specific formatting help (buy the book :)
and Purdue doesn’t mention a quote within a quote…
Thank you for any help!!!
You are an ENORMOUS help to us literary n00bs :)
~Kathy
You’re playing the telephone game — I am reading what you say Banzhaf said the New York Times said something called the “National Bureau of Economic Statistics” said.
I just did a Google search, and I found a US Bureau of Economic Analysis and National Bureau of Economic Research. I don’t know anything about economics, so I don’t know whether perhaps the same organization had a recent name change, but it looks to me like Google references to NBES are actually talking about the NBER instead. At any rate, that’s enough of a warning sign that I’d say the problem is not how to cite Banzhaf, but rather how to trace the 68% statistic directly to its source. (I’d start by looking for the NYT article that Banzhaf mentions.)
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