The Research Paper Created by M. Bowles January 2005 Arlington High School Arlington, Texas

The purpose of this presentation is to help you with the process of writing your research paper. By following these guidelines closely you will avoid committing plagiarism.

Plagiarism occurs when a writer uses another person’s ideas or words without giving that person credit. Plagiarism is unethical and illegal. Moreover…

…plagiarism will cause you to fail the research paper assignment because…

…all English teachers are equipped with highly sensitive plagiarism- sensing equipment.

So, pay careful attention to this presentation and get ready for a successful research paper experience!

 Source Citations  Source Copies  Works Cited Page  Parenthetical Documentation We will cover the following areas:

Source Cards Put source number here 1 Citation information goes here

What does “citation” mean? Where you got your information and who gets credit for it: author(s), title(s), publisher, dates, web addresses, etc.

Sample source card 2 Banks, Ann. "American Memory." Voices from the Thirties. The Library of Congress. 14 Jan Now watch this! This information goes…

Works Cited Banks, Ann. "American Memory." Voices from the Thirties. The Library of Congress. 14 Jan …on your Works Cited page!

Let’s see that again! 2 Works Cited Banks, Ann. "American Memory." Voices from the Thirties. The Library of Congress. 14 Jan

What if I have more than one source?

Ok, let’s say you have 3 sources.

Lee, Harper. To Kill a Mockingbird. Philadelphia: Warner Books, Banks, Ann. "American Memory." Voices from the Thirties. The Library of Congress. 14 Jan " A Short History of the TVA." River Systems Operations. Tennessee Valley Authority. 21 Jan. 2005

They will all go on the Works Cited page. 1 Works Cited Lee, Harper. To Kill a Mockingbird. Philadelphia:Warner Books, Banks, Ann. "American Memory." Voices from the Thirties. The Library of Congress.14 Jan "A Short History of the TVA." River Systems Operations. Tennessee Valley Authority. 21 Jan Ok…but aren’t they supposed to be in alphabetical order according to the first item in each citation?

Ok, now they’re in alphabetical order, but there’s one more thing to do. You have to use hanging indentation. It’s opposite from the way a paragraph is indented. Watch this…

Works Cited "A Short History of the TVA." River Systems Operations. Tennessee Valley Authority. 21 Jan Banks, Ann. "American Memory.“ Voices from the Thirties. The Library of Congress. 14 Jan Lee, Harper. To Kill a Mockingbird. Philadelphia:Warner Books, Voila! Hanging indentation!

Let’s say you are doing your paper on “The Scottsboro Trial” and you have found a primary source on the internet that you want to use.

Be sure to make a source card for the source before doing anything else.

This is the page where the information was found. Get all of the necessary citation information from it for your source card. web addressweb page title web site title owner

"Scottsboro: An American Tragedy." American Experience PBS. 31 Jan < wgbh/amex/scottsboro/>. 4 Here is the resulting source card. How are we supposed to know what order the information goes in? You must consult The MLA Handbook. You have a short version in the back of your grammar book, and your teacher has a complete version.

Now your source card is done, so you’re ready to start your source copies. Here we go!

This part looks good, so you make a photo copy and highlight this area.

4 Important! Number your copy with the same number as the source from which they came!

If the source is a book be sure to put the page number at the bottom of the copy.

1 4 Just one more thing…If you copy the text verbatim (word for word), you must place quotation marks around it.

Are we always supposed to copy everything verbatim for a research paper? No! In fact it’s usually best to paraphrase the information into your own words using the fewest words possible.

Here’s what the card looked like before.

“In 1933, Roy Wright, youngest of the Scottsboro Boys, was held in Birmingham Prison while his co- defendants languished on death row in Kilby Prison in Montgomery. “Roy Wright Roy Wright’s situation 4 We’ll change this…

Roy Wright’s situation 1933, Roy Wright, held in Birmingham PrisonRoy Wright 4 Roy Wright’s situation …to this.

Each note card should only contain one piece of information so that they can all be easily sorted into an appropriate order. Watch this…

1933, Roy Wright, held in Birmingham PrisonRoy Wright 4 Roy Wright’s situation 4 Roy Wright’s Testimony “The firstest I knowed anything was wrong, or knowed who else was on that train was when that crowd of white men stopped the train in Paint Rock and took us off. “ 5 Wright’s release July Roy Wright released, all charges dropped This card would logically go at the end, since it tells about an event that happened after those on the other 2 cards.

5 Wright’s release July Roy Wright released, all charges dropped 4 Roy Wright’s Testimony “The firstest I knowed anything was wrong, or knowed who else was on that train was when that crowd of white men stopped the train in Paint Rock and took us off. “ 1933, Roy Wright, held in Birmingham PrisonRoy Wright 4 Roy Wright’s situation

5 Wright’s release July Roy Wright released, all charges dropped 4 Roy Wright’s Testimony “The firstest I knowed anything was wrong, or knowed who else was on that train was when that crowd of white men stopped the train in Paint Rock and took us off. “ 1933, Roy Wright, held in Birmingham PrisonRoy Wright 4 Roy Wright’s situation Note: These numbers have nothing to do with the order of the cards. They are the numbers of your sources that you will need to do parenthetical documentation.

Now let’s move on to documentation (citation in ). parenthetical parentheses

Remember those note cards we put in order a minute ago?

5 Wright’s release July Roy Wright released, all charges dropped 4 Roy Wright’s Testimony “The firstest I knowed anything was wrong, or knowed who else was on that train was when that crowd of white men stopped the train in Paint Rock and took us off. “ 1933, Roy Wright, held in Birmingham PrisonRoy Wright 4 Roy Wright’s situation Together these 3 cards can form a paragraph, so let’s start with this first one.

1933, Roy Wright, held in Birmingham PrisonRoy Wright 4 Roy Wright’s situation Since you paraphrased this information you will need to rewrite it with elaboration in the paper.

Roy Wright was one of the boys accused in the Scottsboro incident. Topic sentence In 1933, Roy Wright was being held in the prison in Birmingham. This is information you did not know before you did research. Therefore, you must give credit to the source. Otherwise, you are committing plagiarism.

Roy Wright was one of the boys accused in the Scottsboro incident. In 1933, Roy Wright was being held in the prison in Birmingham ( ). You have to go back to the note card and source card to figure out what goes in the parentheses for the parenthetical documentation.

1933, Roy Wright, held in Birmingham PrisonRoy Wright 4 Roy Wright’s situation Here’s your source number, so….

American Experience PBS. 31 Jan < wgbh/ amex/scottsboro/>. 4 “Scottsboro: An American Tragedy.” This must be the source card that goes with it.

American Experience PBS. 31 Jan < wgbh/ amex/scottsboro/>. 4 “Scottsboro: An American Tragedy.” Use the first item in the citation for your parenthetical documentation.

Roy Wright was one of the boys accused in the Scottsboro incident. (“Scottsboro: An American Tragedy”). Technically, when a citation is that long you only have to use the first word followed by ellipses. Watch… (“Scottsboro…”). In 1933, Roy Wright was being held in the prison in Birmingham

Now that we’ve done one citation correctly, let’s continue writing the paper.

Where did we put those 3 note cards we had?...

5 Wright’s release July Roy Wright released, all charges dropped 4 Roy Wright’s Testimony “The firstest I knowed anything was wrong, or knowed who else was on that train was when that crowd of white men stopped the train in Paint Rock and took us off. “ “1933, Roy Wright, youngest of the Scottsboro Boys, was held in Birmingham Prison while his co- defendants languished on death row in Kilby Prison in Montgomery. “Roy Wright Roy Wright’s situation 4 Here they are. We’ve already used the one on top, so let’s go to the next one.

4 Roy Wright’s Testimony “The firstest I knowed anything was wrong, or knowed who else was on that train was when that crowd of white men stopped the train in Paint Rock and took us off. “ We need to put a transition in before this, though.

Roy Wright was one of the boys accused in the Scottsboro incident. (“Scottsboro…”). At his trial Roy Wright denied any wrongdoing. He is quoted as having said, In 1933, Roy Wright was being held in the prison in Birmingham Transition firstest I knowed anything was wrong, or knowed who else was on that train was when that crowd of white men stopped the train in Paint Rock and took us off.” “The

Roy Wright was one of the boys accused in the Scottsboro incident. In 1933, Roy Wright was being held in the prison in Birmingham (“Scottsboro…”).At his trial Roy Wright denied any wrongdoing. He is quoted as having said, firstest I knowed anything was wrong, or knowed who else was on that train was when that crowd of white men stopped the train in Paint Rock and took us off.” “The This quote is from the same source we used before.

Roy Wright was one of the boys accused in the Scottsboro incident. In 1933, Roy Wright was being held in the prison in Birmingham (“Scottsboro…”).At his trial Roy Wright denied any wrongdoing. He is quoted as having said, firstest I knowed anything was wrong, or knowed who else was on that train was when that crowd of white men stopped the train in Paint Rock and took us off” “The (“Scottsboro…”). (“Scottsboro…”).

Now we just have one more card to go before this paragraph is finished.

5 Wright’s release July Roy Wright released, all charges dropped Here’s that third note card. Linder, Doug. "Chronology." The Scottsboro Boys' Trials. Famous Trials. 29 Jan umkc. edu/ faculty/projects/FTrials/ scottsboro /SB_chron.htmlhttp:// umkc. edu 5 And here’s the source card that goes with it.

Roy Wright was one of the boys accused in the Scottsboro incident. In 1933, Roy Wright was being held in the prison in Birmingham (“Scottsboro…”).At his trial Roy Wright denied any wrongdoing. He is quoted as having said, firstest I knowed anything was wrong, or knowed who else was on that train was when that crowd of white men stopped the train in Paint Rock and took us off” “The (“Scottsboro…”). Wright was eventually released when the charges against him were dropped (Linder). Now we can finish this paragraph by adding this information with the correct parenthetical documentation.

Roy Wright was one of the boys accused in the Scottsboro incident. In 1933, Roy Wright was being held in the prison in Birmingham At his trial Roy Wright denied any wrongdoing. He is quoted as having said, “The firstest I knowed anything was wrong, or knowed who else was on that train was when that crowd of white men stopped the train in Paint Rock and took us off” (“Scottsboro…”). Wright was eventually released when the charges against him were dropped (Linder). If your entire paper consisted of only this paragraph, the Works Cited page would only list these 2 sources.

Works Cited Go back and find your source cards to get the necessary information.

Works Cited American Experience PBS. 31 Jan < wgbh/ amex/scottsboro/>. An American Tragedy.”“Scottsboro: American Experience PBS. 31 Jan < wgbh/ amex/scottsboro/>. 4 An American Tragedy.”“Scottsboro:

Works Cited American Experience PBS. 31 Jan < wgbh/ amex/scottsboro/>. An American Tragedy.”“Scottsboro: Linder, Doug. "Chronology." The Scottsboro Boys' Trials. Famous Trials. 29 Jan umkc. eduumkc. edu/ faculty/projects/FTrials/ scottsboro /SB_chron.html Linder, Doug. "Chronology." The Scottsboro Boys' Trials. Famous Trials. 29 Jan umkc. edu/ faculty/projects/FTrials/ scottsboro /SB_chron.htmlhttp:// umkc. edu 5

Works Cited American Experience PBS. 31 Jan < wgbh/ amex/scottsboro/>. An American Tragedy.”“Scottsboro: Linder, Doug. "Chronology." The Scottsboro Boys' Trials. Famous Trials. 29 Jan umkc. eduumkc. edu/ faculty/projects/FTrials/ scottsboro /SB_chron.html Alphabetical order, please!

Works Cited American Experience PBS. 31 Jan < wgbh/ amex/scottsboro/>. An American Tragedy.”“Scottsboro: Linder, Doug. "Chronology." The Scottsboro Boys' Trials. Famous Trials. 29 Jan umkc. eduumkc. edu/ faculty/projects/FTrials/ scottsboro /SB_chron.html Hanging indentation, please!

Works Cited American Experience PBS. 31 Jan < wgbh/ amex/scottsboro/>. An American Tragedy.”“Scottsboro: Linder, Doug. "Chronology." The Scottsboro Boys' Trials. Famous Trials. 29 Jan umkc. eduumkc. edu/ faculty/projects/FTrials/ scottsboro /SB_chron.html That’s it!

There are many different forms for parenthetical documentation as well as for the Works Cited page. These can all be found in The MLA Handbook.

Good luck on your paper!

The End