Acknowledging sources in academic scenarios

Grave and Kaplan (1996) allege that “academic writing is a type of writing that involves composing for knowledge transforming” (as cited in Pintos, & Crimi, 2010b, p. 7). To transform knowledge, it would be necessary to acquire a variety of skills such as knowledge of academic register, formal style, proficiency in language use and critical thinking. Critical thinking will allow us compose, analyse and develop new ideas which are essential abilities in knowledge transforming. However, as Reid (2001) states it is not only a question of understanding what to communicate, but also a matter of understanding how information should be presented and supported (cited in Pintos & Crimi, 2010b, p8).
Information should be presented and supported following a pre-established set of rules. Among the mentioned rules, acknowledging sources is considered a must to avoid plagiarism, to show respect to other author’s works and to sound credible in academic scenarios therefore, it is absolutely necessary to learn how to cite sources properly (Pintos and Crimi, 2010a). This paper will analyze how Myles (2002) uses quotations, omissions, insertions, reporting verbs, in text-citations and any other relevant elements in order to enhance the credibility of her writing and give support to her own claims.
In Myles’ (2002) article, different types of in text-citations can be analyzed: Parenthetical citations, paraphrased citations, block quotations and direct quotes. All of them appear to be highly integrated to the text. For instance, short quotations seem to be blended into the text by means of the prepositions by, as, in or of. In long quotations, she achieves the same assimilation to the text using a wide variety of reporting verbs such as propose, argue, discuss, observe and point out, between others. She also takes advantage of the use of introductory phrases as it can be seen in the following example: According to the researchers “conceptualizing this transition as a social/cognitive act ...emphasizes both the problem-solving effort of a student learning to negotiate a new situation and the role the situation will play in what is learned” (p. 3).
In addition, Myles (2002) has made use of omissions and insertions. In this case Myles (2002) has combined several strategies paraphrasing, direct quotation, use of by to introduce a short quotation and omission: In fact, Bereinter and Scardamalia (1987) criticize formal schooling that encourages the more passive kind of cognition by “continually telling students what to do”, rather than encouraging them “to follow their spontaneous interests and impulses . . . and assume responsibility for what becomes of their minds” (p. 3). The following example of an insertion is included in a block quotation and preceded by an introductory phrase: According to Mclaughlin (1988), transfer errors can occur because:
[L]earners lack the necessary information in the second language or the attentional
capacity to activate the appropriate second-language routine. But such an account
says little about why certain linguistic forms transfer and others do not. (p. 7)


After all this analysis, it can be concluded that Myles (2002) has almost certainly used a vast repertoire of reporting verbs which contributed to make her article’s reading more lively. She also searched deeply into different well known authors’ works and took advantage of their words to construct new knowledge and allow the readers to hear her voice. What is more, she succeeded in using a variety of strategies for acknowledging sources and so, made her paper interesting and worth reading. Therefore, it is very probable that she has succeeded in composing an article that fulfils the academic writing requirements and as Banfi (1997) claims “[has contributed] to the advancement of knowledge in the field” (cited in Pintos & Crimi, 2010b, p8).









References
Myles, J. (2002). Second language writing and research: The writing process and error
analysis in student texts. Teaching English as a Second or foreign language, 6, (2).
Queen’s University. Retrieved October 2010, from
http://www-writing.berkeley.edu/TESL-EJ/ej22/a1.html
Pintos, V., & Crimi, Y. (2010a). Unit 2: Personal narratives in teaching. Universidad
CAECE: Buenos Aires, Argentina. Retrieved, September, 2010, from
http://caece.campusuniversidad.com.ar/mod/resource/view.php?id=7214
Pintos, V., & Crimi, Y. (2010b). Unit 3: Academic writing. Universidad CAECE: Buenos
Aires, Argentina. Retrieved, September, 2010, from
http://caece.campusuniversidad.com.ar/mod/resource/index.php?id=7392