EMBEDDING QUOTATIONS IN A SENTENCE

Each piece of quoted material in a paragraph must have a transition that gives the context and background for that quote. Embedding quotations using transition helps quoted material flow naturally and coherently into your paragraph.

Example (transition is underlined): While traveling on a bus, the author is “heart-filled, head-filled with glee” (Brown 2).

When written properly, the reader should not be able to hear where the quotation marks are when the sentence is read aloud. A properly embedded quotation creates a seamless transition from the background information to the quoted material. When done poorly, the transition is choppy, incomplete, and predictable.

Poor example: This is shown by “and he was no whit bigger” (Smith 6).

The prior example is poor because you can easily hear where the writer’s words end and the quote begins. Also, the sentence does not make sense. What is shown by this quote? Every sentence in a paragraph must make sense, regardless of whether or not it contains quoted material.

You may need to change words within your quote so that the sentence is grammatically correct and is coherent.

When changing words in a sentence, indicate the change by placing brackets [ ] around the change in the word or the changed word.

Example: Feminist Criticism applies to The Dead Poets’ Society because the film “[lacks] complex female characters and [deems] the female... an outsider” (SpringBoard 341). The original words in the quote were “lack” and “deem,” but these verb tenses did not fit with my sentence. Therefore, I changed the tense of the verb to fit the sentence and indicated the change by placing the words in brackets.

To omit words in the middle of a long quote, use ellipses (…)

Example: The other boy “called me ‘jerk.’... That’s all that I remember” (Jones 8-12).

Notice that anytime you change or add something in a quote, you must indicate your change. If you change a word, put brackets [ ] around the word you changed. If you omit part of the quote, use ellipses (...) in place of the part you left out.

How to create a good transition into a quotation:

1) Give background and context for all quoted material – i.e., what is happening or who is speaking.

2) Only use the most important part of the quote (for a short paper, ideally less than 10 words)

3) Read your sentence aloud – can you “hear” the quotation marks? You shouldn’t.

4) Change word tense if necessary and omit unnecessary words and phrases; use ellipses and brackets to indicate your changes