A direct quote is a word-for-word copy of source material. The quote is enclosed in quotation marks. Include the author's name and page numbers. If your quote is more than 4 lines long, use a block quote.
Author Incorporated into Text:
Joseph Conrad writes of the company manager in Heart of Darkness, "He was obeyed, yet he inspired neither love nor fear, nor even respect" (87).
Author After Quotation:
"The red tree vole is a crucial part of the spotted owl's diet" (Moone 15).
The block quote is used for quotations that are longer than 4 lines of prose or 3 lines of verse. Do not use quotation marks. Introduce the block quote on a new line. Indent the entire quote 1 inch from the left margin. Include the page number at the end of your block quote outside of the ending period. Be sure to specify the source in the introduction phrase/sentence, which ends in either a colon or a period.
Example:
At the conclusion of Lord of the Flies,Ralph and the other boys realize the horror of their actions:
The tears began to flow and sobs shook him. He gave himself up to them now for the first time on the island; great, shuddering spasms of grief that seemed to wrench his whole body. His voice rose under the black smoke before the burning wreckage of the island; and infected by that emotion, the other little boys began to shake and sob too. (186)
A paraphrase is a way to represent an idea from a source in your own words. It is typically as long as the original quotation. Paraphrasing is used most often to explain jargon or difficult to understand information in terms the reader can easily understand.
MLA requires you to include the author's name and page number.
Author Incorporated into Text:
Robert Lenz states that Oregon salmon populations have dramatically declined in the past decade (27).
Author After Paraphrase:
Oregon salmon populations have dramatically declined in the past decade (Lenz 27).
If you are citing a single fact or paraphrased idea that is attributable to more than one source, list all sources in the in-text citation. Separate multiple sources with semicolons.
Example:
While reading may be the core of literacy, literacy can be complete only when reading is accompanied by writing (Baron 194; Jacobs 55).
