Paraphrasing

Paraphrasing is the action of restating someone else’s words in your own words. It is important to keep all the main points of the original words as your main points as well. Even when paraphrasing someone else’s words or ideas, you must correctly cite the source.

Steps to Paraphrasing

Step 1: Read the original text (i.e. book, journal, article, etc.).

Whether you are assigned to a book report or writing a paper, it is important to understand the original text’s chapters or sections. Read a chapter or section multiple times, if necessary.

Step 2: Speak out loud or write down the main points that you remember.

Put the original text aside and think about what you just read. Speaking about what you took away from the text can be helpful to get a steady flow of ideas and to see what sounds right. Writing down main points will allow you to visualize how to organize your paraphrasing.

Step 3: Paraphrase the main points into a few sentences.

After you’ve written down your main takeaways from the text, organize the ideas in a way that still makes sense but is different from the original. Paraphrasing should be approximately the same length of the quote.

Step 4: Compare your paraphrase to the original text.

After you’ve written your own paraphrase, look back at the original text. Anything word for word must be quoted. If you feel as if you were missing a big key point, feel free to paraphrase again or quote the text.

Step 5: Cite the original text.

Citations are necessary even when paraphrasing.

While paraphrasing, it's important to keep these tips in mind:

1. Utilize word choice.
Synonyms are a helpful way to restate what the author is saying by keeping the same main points. Another way to utilize word choice is to change nouns to verbs or vice versa. Lastly, changing the sentence order is another technique often used in paraphrasing.

For example:

Original: To keep social status, men are more inclined than women to intervene in a situation.
Paraphrased: Men have been found more likely to take action during a conflict because of the way they are portrayed in society.

2. Do not copy and paste.
If you copy and paste, you are more likely to keep the author’s voice rather than making it your own, often opting to replace words instead of changing sentence structure. Copying and pasting would be more acceptable for quoting your source, not paraphrasing.

3. Write your own notes.
This will help you to understand your own thought process behind the text. Additionally, you’ll focus on the main points that are important to you and your paper.

4. Always leave time between reading the text and paraphrasing.
This will help to reduce plagiarism. It helps to let the text simmer in your head as to what should be restated and what is able to be left out.