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Research Guides@Tufts

Fletcher Guide for Preparation of Dissertations: Citing and Quoting

Citations

The purposes of citations are as follows:

To cite books, articles, manuscripts, documents, digital sources and other materials from which direct quotations have been taken. All direct quotations, no matter what their length, require a citation.

To cite authority for particularly important or controversial statements or to give proper credit for ideas or statements which, although paraphrased in the paper, are not the writer's own.

To amplify statements made in the body of the text with data that do not have enough bearing or significance to be included in the text proper, but are too important to be omitted entirely.

Either footnotes or the parenthetical reference (author-date) system may be used. Check with faculty advisor before choosing a format.

Quotations

Direct Quotations

Quotations should be made with complete accuracy.

Quotations of less than four lines may be incorporated, with double quotation marks, into the text.

Longer quotations may be set off from the body of the text by indenting from both margins and by single spacing; quotation marks are omitted.

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