Backround/reasearch
Posted: Sun Mar 13, 2011 4:40 pm
Do i have to reword the info or can i just copy it?
Rachael,
Welcome to the forum. I moved your post to a new topic so more experts will see it.
It's good that you're concerned about how to write up your background info! Citing information properly is really important, both to give credit to the person who discovered or explained the information and to show that it comes from a credible source.
Most of the time you will find bits and pieces of info that are important to your study in several different places, and the best way to communicate that is to write a coherent document in your own words, paraphrasing and citing the info from each source.
Sometimes you might find a large chunk of information that's exactly what you want. In that case you can include it word for word, but you put quotation marks around it and also include a citation.
There are different styles of citation, and your teacher will probably tell you which one to use (MLA and APA are common). If you put paraphrase citation into a search engine, you'll find some more info about all of this, for example:
http://www.umuc.edu/cip/vail/students/c ... quote.html
http://www.writing.northwestern.edu/avo ... arism.html
http://www.swarthmore.edu/x10246.xml
Hope that helps,
Amanda