Style sheet (pdf)

5 Quotations and References in the Text
The Golden Rule: Give Credit to Whom Credit is Due.
5.1 When to do it?
Data: When you are analysing or discussing primary data, always indicate the
source. This includes data you have collected yourself.
Research: When you make use of any work by other people, you must always
indicate the source of the information; this also includes personal correspondence or
conversations. Within the text, this usually means the surname of the author(s), the
year of publication and the page number (see Section 5.2).
There are three correct ways of making use of other people‟s studies: quotation,
paraphrase and summary. Anything else is plagiarism or theft, which are illegal.
5.2 Quotations
All references must be provided in the running text and not in footnotes or endnotes.
You may quote if you need to use the exact words of the original. For instance,
this may be because the material is unique and memorable or because the original
statement is well-written and more compelling than a summary or paraphrase of it
would be. A quotation must match the original exactly. Even errors, such as
misprints, must be reproduced; to show that the error is in the original, use [sic]
after the relevant point.
Below, there is a sample of an original text by Schlant. Several examples in this
section will draw from it:
Historians, political scientists, economists, and journalists are constrained (or ought to be)
by facts, and other objective criteria, whereas literature projects the play of information,
exposing levels of conscience and consciousness that are part of a culture‟s unstated
assumptions and frequently unacknowledged elsewhere. Because they are unconsciously
held, these assumptions provide greater insight into the moral positions at work than do its
explicit opinions and images, which are often censored or the expression of wishful
thinking. Literature lays bare a people‟s dreams and nightmares, its hopes and
apprehensions, its moral positions and its failures. It reveals even where it is silent; its
blind spots and absences speak a language stripped of conscious agendas.
(Schlant 1999: 3)
Every change, however trivial, should be indicated. You do so by using square
brackets, as in the example below:
Schlant claims that “[l]iterature [...] reveals even where it is silent; its blind spots
and absences speak a language stripped of conscious agendas” (1999: 3).
4