Paraphrasing is restating a text you have read by using mostly your own words. It can help you clarify the meaning of an obscure or ambiguous passage. It is one of the three ways of integrating other people’s ideas and information into your own writing, along with quoting (reproducing exactly the language of the source text) and summarizing (distilling the main ideas or gist of the source text). You might choose to paraphrase rather than quote when the source’s language is not especially arresting or memorable. You might paraphrase short passages but summarize longer ones.
Following are two passages. The first is from paragraph 2 of the excerpt from King’s “Letter.” The second passage is a paraphrase of the first:
Original
I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that law and order exist for the purpose of establishing justice and that when they fail in this purpose they become the dangerously structured dams that block the flow of social progress. I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that the present tension in the South is a necessary phase of the transition from an obnoxious negative peace, in which the Negro passively accepted his unjust plight, to a substantive and positive peace, in which all men will respect the dignity and worth of human personality.
Paraphrase
King writes that he had hoped for more understanding from white moderates—specifically that they would recognize that law and order are not ends in themselves but means to the greater end of establishing justice. When law and order do not serve this greater end, they stand in the way of progress. King expected the white moderate to recognize that the current tense situation in the South is part of a transition process that is necessary for progress. The current situation is bad because although there is peace, it is an “obnoxious” and “negative” kind of peace based on blacks passively accepting the injustice of the status quo. A better kind of peace—one that is “substantive,” real and not imaginary, as well as “positive”—requires that all people, regardless of race, be valued.
When you compare the paraphrase to the original, you can see that the paraphrase contains all the important information and ideas of the original. Notice also that the paraphrase is somewhat longer than the original, refers to the writer by name, and encloses King’s original words in quotation marks. The paraphrase tries to be neutral, to avoid inserting the reader’s opinions or distorting the original writer’s ideas.
Paraphrasing