Here is the same example again, with the student using ellipsis: Choose only the important phrases or key words, and remove the remaining sentence by replacing it with an ellipsis (…). If you have a long quotation you wish to use, be selective. You should aim to keep your quotations to less than 2 lines on an A4 writing page. Your assessor will not mark you highly if the bulk of your paragraphs consists of long quotations. Long quotations comprise of more than one sentence – avoid using them as evidence. I realised then that I had begun to step small and carry myself all hunched, keeping my arms at my sides and my elbows tucked, as if to leave room for them.’ ( Year of Wonders, Geraldine Brooks ) The multitudes of deaths surrounding Anna began to take its toll on her, burdening her with guilt as ‘sometimes, if I walked the main street of the village in the evening, I felt the press of their ghosts. ( Sticks and Stones and Such-like, Sunil Badami in Growing Up Asian in Australia)Ī phrase quotation is the most common quotation length you will use in essays. Sunil Badami ‘still found it hard to tie my Indian appearance to my Australian feeling', showing that for Sunil, his culture was not Indian, but Australian due to his upbringing. This is because you are able to demonstrate that you can focus on one word and develop an entire idea around it. Single worded quotations can often leave the largest impression on the assessor. (VCAA ‘Can Money Buy Happiness’ Language Analysis) The word ‘evaporates’, used to characterise money and happiness intends to instill the idea that happiness as a result of money is only temporary.
Remember that the essay is your piece of work and should consist mainly of your own ideas and thoughts. Overcrowding your essay with too many quotations will lead to failure to develop your ideas, as well as your work appearing too convoluted for your assessor. Generally speaking, the absolute minimum is three quotes per paragraph but you should not overload your paragraphs either. Thus, you must be selective in how much you want to quote. Quotations are a ‘support’ system, much like a back up for your ideas and arguments. How Much You Want To QuoteĪ quotation should never tell the story for you. Conversely, an essay with no quotations will not achieve many marks either. Throwing in quotations just to make your essay appear more sophisticated will only be more damaging if the quotation does not adequately reinforce or expand on your contention. Quotations can be irrelevant if a student merely adds in quotes as ‘sentence fillers’. Never quote just for the sake of quoting. Description of a symbol or other literary technique.This is dependent on which aspect of the text you are discussing, for example:
A quote should add insight into your argument therefore, it is imperative that the quote you choose relates intrinsically to your discussion.
Overcrowding or overloading of quotations.However, quotations must be used correctly, otherwise you risk (and these frequent mistakes will be discussed in detail later): The usage of quotations in essays demonstrates: You can choose either style, just be consistent in your essays. The American standard involves styling quotations with the double inverted comma. Single inverted commas are preferred in Australia as they follow the British standard. There is no general rule in Australia regarding which type of inverted comma you must use for quotations. These quotation marks are illustrated by inverted commas, either single inverted commas (‘ ’) or double inverted commas (“ ”). The punctuation mark used to indicate a repetition of another author’s work is presented through quotation marks. The discussion on quotations in this study guide can be applied to all three areas of study in the VCAA English course which have been explained in detail in our Ultimate Guides to VCE Text Response, Comparative and Language Analysis.Ī quotation is the repetition of a group of words taken from a text by someone other than the original author. Using quotations in essays helps to demonstrate your knowledge of the text, and provides solid evidence for your arguments. Quotations, better known by their abbreviation ‘quotes’, are a form of evidence used in VCE essays.