The Rowman & Littlefield Guide to Writing With Sources

Rating:
Summary: Useful, Streamlined, and Economical
Review: This is a terrific book on source use, plain and simple. It's arranged sensibly according to the most frequently-asked questions ('When Do You Need to Acknowledge a Source?', 'When Should You Paraphrase and When Should You Quote?', 'How Should You Punctuate Quotations?'), and Davis's concise and congenial advice informs us about the challenges of using electronic sources while providing excellent, clear, interdisciplinary, problem-solving examples.

And it does all this in a fraction of the space allotted to the topic in style manuals, where both the subject of citation and the posture of writers toward their sources inevitably get diluted by obligatory attention to the regulations of Standard English usage. Davis's guide is, therefore, clearly as important for what it's not as for what it is. It's NOT a style manual (though it describes the ways different manuals handle citations and urges students to get style manuals for their fields); it's NOT a bibliography of research materials; it's NOT a guide to research in academic fields. It IS a sharp and constructive companion for your pursuit of the best ways to choose, assess, paraphrase, quote, and integrate source material into your writing. This tight focus'a keen decision on the part of both Davis and his publishers'foregrounds a subject which has probably never been more important. The book is perfectly suited for individuals who desire guidance on these matters, or (as in my case) for use in a writing class or even a first-year orientation program.

I think Davis may be at his very best when he covers electronic and internet sources. His discussion of the way the Web has transformed the way we gather and transport information (pages 33-41) is keen and insightful, and his thoroughly practical bent on the subject shows that he's been a thoughtful teacher of these matters for quite a while. Be sure not to miss the nicely-conceived section titled 'A Further Note About Style Manuals,' where we get a series of sample citations for articles, books, and Web sites in the five major divisional formats (MLA, CMS, CBE, APA, and APSA).

Finally, Davis discusses plagiarism, but in the broader context of how a writer chooses, evaluates, and uses material from pre-existing sources. This approach is much less legalistic and fear-inspiring than 90% of the published discussions, and is more attuned to the advantages one gains when using sources responsibly'the advantages in confidence and authority, as well as the added likelihood of unity and coherence in writing. It's all approached less as a matter of avoiding judicial action than as making choices when thinking about the rhetoric of an essay. That's a rare virtue, and helps makes this a rare resource.