Editing

Editing for Proper Use of Sources

When you incorporate other sources into your own writing, those sources must be properly documented or you may be accused of plagiarism. In addition, you should clearly build up to the borrowed information and follow it up with a connection to your own writing. When you edit a paper, check carefully for the following:

All outside sources in your writing should include language building up to those sources. This language should signal that someone else’s ideas are about to appear. A phrase like “According to a 2014 Pew Research Center study on financial aid…” or “FDA spokesperson Stephanie Yao reports that…” clearly introduces another person’s language.
Any exact words from an outside source should be placed in quotation marks. If you have summarized or paraphrased another author’s ideas, be sure you have used your own words and structures – simply rewriting sentences using synonyms is not acceptable.
Any time an outside source is used – whether you put the information in a direct quotation, a paraphrase, or a summary – proper documentation is required. Proper documentation consists of a mention of the author and page number (if any) in the text, and a complete entry for the source in a works cited list.
All outside sources should be clearly connected to your own writing. Immediately following the borrowed language or ideas, make sure you have shown readers how this information applies to your own main ideas.