A paraphrase:
§ a restatement or rewording of a paragraph or text
§ a way to avoid plagiarizing: borrow, clarify, or expand on information.
§ an important tool to use when writing research papers, essays, and pieces of
journalism.
Original sentence:
§ She angered me with her inappropriate comments, rumor-spreading, and
disrespectfulness at the formal dinner table.
Paraphrased sentences:
§ She made me angry when she was rude at dinner. (shortened + simplified)
§ Her impoliteness, gossiping, and general lack of respect at dinner infuriated me.
§ I was mad when she started spreading rumors, making inappropriate comments, and
disrespecting other guests at our dinner.
§ using the exact words of someone else, with proper acknowledgement, but without
quotation marks.
§ changing a few words and phrases while mostly retaining the original structure
and/or progression of ideas of the original, and information without
acknowledgement.
§ paraphrasing another’s ideas or words without credit.
1. Using synonyms (words that mean the same)
2. Changing the form of words
3. Changing the grammatical structure
4. Using several techniques
§ Here; “may” is replaced with “is likely to”
and “put upward pressure on“ is replaced
with “push up”.
§ Be careful when using synonyms. Many
words have several meanings, depending
on context, and you have to think about
the synonym which expresses the right
meaning for the particular context.
§
§ In the first paraphrase a verb has been
replaced with a noun from the same word
family. In the second an adjective has
been replaced by a noun.
§ Here one grammatical structure for
making a comparison (“slower than”) has
been replaced with another (“not as rapid
as”).
§ In this final example, you will notice that:
• the order in which information is
presented is different in the paraphrase
• different word forms in the same word
family have been used (effective
regulation > regulated effectively)
• synonyms have been used (in the absence
of competition > without competition).
1. Successful paraphrasing requires the use of multiple techniques
each time.
§ It is not sufficient to simply replace the keywords with synonyms and in
fact this is a common mistake among students learning to paraphrase.
§ Changing the structure of the sentence is also important to fit the
sentence into your paragraph effectively.
2. The techniques should only be used once you have ensured you
fully understood the text.
§ do not try to paraphrase a text you have not understood.
ORIGINAL TEXT PARAPHRASING TEXT
Despite the undoubted fact that We all have different ideas about
everyone's vision of what success. What's important is that
constitutes success is different, you spend time defining your
one should spend one's time version of success. That way, you'll
establishing and finalizing one's understand what you should be
personal vision of it. Otherwise, working toward. You'll also know if
how can you possibly understand your decisions are helping you to
Identify the
what your final destination might move toward your goals.
be, or whether or not your Used as part of your personal techniques used to
decisions are assisting you in approach to goal-setting, mission paraphrase the
moving in the direction of the and vision statements are useful original text
goals which you've set yourself? for bringing sharp focus to your
The two kinds of statement – most important goal, and for
mission and vision – can be helping you to quickly identify
invaluable to your approach, which opportunities you should
aiding you, as they do, in focusing pursue.
on your primary goal, and quickly
identifying possibilities that you
might wish to exploit and
explore.
Paraphrase the following sentences, explain the techniques that you use:
1. A college student usually has homework to do.
2. If we persist with the treatment, we will have a huge debt.
3. We should have a right to assemble peacefully without surveillance.
4. The police use hidden-video cameras. Therefore, they do not have to put
their lives in danger.
5. There has been a significant growth in the use of the Internet since 2000.
6. The inadequacy of baggage carts is one of the major problems at the
airport.
PRACTICE 2
1. CO2 emissions have caused the rising level of global warming.
2. Minority languages are no longer necessary due to the widespread use of English, Spanish and Chinese
3. Learning to manage money is one of the key aspects of adult life.
4. Learning a foreign language increases the opportunity to work and travel abroad.
5. Doing exercises regularly greatly improves one’s health.
6. The increasing number of tourists contribute to the economic development of the local area.
7. Excessive use of smartphones may result in several health problems.
8. Portable entertainment devices, such as MP3 or DVD-players, which allow people to listen to music or watch films on the
move, are now commonplace.
9. In some countries, many more people are choosing to live alone nowadays than in the past.
10. Nowadays new technologies have had an influence on communication between people.
