UWRT 100 Critical Reading and Writing (Torres): MLA/APA Citations

https://infoguides.rit.edu/prf.php?id=5900a2be-7cdb-11ed-9922-0ad758b798c3

Why Should we use Citations?

Why Do We Need to Cite Sources for Papers or Presentations? 

  • you need to acknowledge another person's work and ideas and give him credit.
  • gain credibility as your paper shows you did the research to evaluate and select the best sources.
  • avoid plagiarism.
  • sources are easier to find for the reader.

How Do You Incorporate Sources Within Your Paper or Presentation?

  • Quoting--Copy a line or two word for word, set off by quotation marks.
  • Summarizing--Restate the main ideas in your own words which is shorter than the original.
  • Paraphrasing--Take an idea and put it in your own words.

APA

APA (American Psychological Association) style was established  in order to create a simple set of procedures, or “style” guidelines, that would codify the many components of scientific writing. “Scientific” includes both some of the physical sciences as well as the social sciences such as psychology, anthropology, criminal justice, sociology, etc.

The American Psychological Association's own website which offers many examples of the most commonly cited types of sources. For a list of examples for different types of sources, click on the tab entitled, "Style and Grammar Guidelines."

Ebooks

Academic Integrity and Citation

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Rochester Institute of Technology strives to create an environment where student, staff, and faculty hold themselves to high standards of academic integrity.  The policies regarding student academic integrity are outlined very clearly on the University Policies' webpage.  A violation of student academic integrity may fall into any of the three following areas:

  • Cheating - Cheating is defined by the Student Academic Integrity Policy as "any form of fraudulent or deceptive academic act, including falsification of data, possessing, providing, or using unapproved materials, sources, or tools for a project, exam, or body of work submitted for faculty evaluation."
  • Duplicate Submission - "Duplicate submission is the submitting of the same or similar work for credit in more than one course without prior approval of the instructors for those same courses."
  • Plagiarism - The final form of academic integrity breach is plagiarism, which is described by the Student Academic Integrity Policy as "the representation of others’ ideas as one’s own without giving proper attribution to the original author or authors. Plagiarism occurs when a student copies direct phrases from a text (e.g. books, journals, and internet) and does not provide quotation marks or paraphrases or summarizes those ideas without giving credit to the author or authors. In all cases, if such information is not properly and accurately documented with appropriate credit given, then the student has committed plagiarism."

For more information and to read the Student Academic Integrity Policy in full, please follow this link.

All images on this guide are either created by the guide maker, or courtesy of Creative Commons.

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