Thylacoleo is on the prowl...

[ithika]

Essay writing question:

So if I write "As Taylor so astutely put it in his text The Vital Landscape, 18th century scholars believed that 'human beings were distinguished from minerals, plants and animals by the faculty of reason.'" or something similar, in my essay, do I then have to footnote that sentence? I honestly don't know  - I'm letting the reader know that this sentence is not my own, but it doesn't tell them where to look for the quote. I'm thinking footnote it. But I don't want to over-reference, because I got told off for that once and I think it's a silly thing to lose points for.

Comments

[reaps.livejournal.com]

i would footnote it

[auntpol.livejournal.com]

seconded

[arinellen.livejournal.com]

I would put (T, Lastname YEAR). Because that is what we do in Philosophy. But you should really check on the Arch. site what they use. It will be specific to them.

[reaps.livejournal.com]

danica is correct, make sure you use the correct reference style :)

[bloodied-aura.livejournal.com]

Thankyou all, I think that sounds sensible. :)

[auntpol.livejournal.com]

Philosophy don't really care about referencing, though. I tend to go the footnote route, because ... I like it better and that's what we do in English.

[bloodied-aura.livejournal.com]

We are required to have footnotes, generally (I think the minimum to be considered passable is currently 12) but I had this weird lecture note that said something about mentioning who you're quoting in the text and stuff, which I talked about above. I can't find mention of it in the "Essay Writing Guidelines" though, so yeah I'm going to footnote it as well.

I like footnotes too! They are tiny number love. And the new word actually makes them easier to do. ♥

Why don't Philosophy care about referencing that much? I would have thought that it would be just as important as in other schools? Because even if you're coming up with your own ideas you're still using other people's thoughts to inform your stuff aren't you? Or am I wrong?
/procrastinates

[auntpol.livejournal.com]

What I meant was that they don't mind about which style you use. Some disciplines are !nasty about using an EXACT referencing format (e.g. harvard). Philosophy are like, eh, if we can reasonably find what you're talking about, you're all good.

[bloodied-aura.livejournal.com]

Oh okay. :) That seems a nice way of doing things.
ALVA recommends Harvard, but apparently only because of some dumb thing where people get Oxford wrong more often. I used Oxford in my first essay and my tutor wrote "nice to see someone use Oxford referencing correctly!"
so I use that.
But still it's... odd. The whole faculty is... odd.