Using the Source Sandwich Strategy (pg 4)

Using the Source Sandwich Strategy
Internal Content Placement Strategies to Have a Flawless Argument

You have finally found a source that will support the sub-point topic of one of your body-paragraphs. The paragraph—as a whole—will be filled with source sandwiches that properly argue your overall point of the body-paragraph—which stems from the THESIS statement.

Using Sources:  

You will embed reworded source content through paraphrasing or summarizing.  Rewording source content is most beneficial for your argument because:

1.  It allows you to smoothly integrate the support into your sentence using your voice and pattern. 

2.  It helps you to fully understand the support for the argument in your writing.

3.  It helps you to LEAD the writing (argument) with your own content ideas and peppered-source-support in the form of integrated, scholarly ideas.

NOTE:  You will still provide an in-text citation within sentences that contain reworded source content.  Just because you have reworded the source into either a summary or paraphrases idea does not mean that it was your original content.  It still belongs to someone else and must be attributed to the original author. 

Remember: you must have more paraphrased material in your writing content than quoted material when using outside sources.) 

STEP 1-Creating the 'top bun' of the source sandwich. To embed a source into your body-paragraph, you first need to decide what the important point is from the source that you want to use to argue the sub-point of the body-paragraph. You will consider the sub-point you are arguing in the body-pararaph, and create a unique sentence that advocates X (the topic) as a necessary component of Y (the sub-point) as it relates to Z (the THESIS).

STEP 2-Creating the 'meat' of the sandwich.  Do not simply copy and paste a quote to use in your sentence.  While sometimes this tactic will work to at least establish source support for your argument, in general, you will need to paraphrase the source for best integration and most professionally sounding writing.

Once you have created a sentence of your own—with the source content paraphrased within it, you then need to build the buns for your sandwich.

Integrating sources into a sentence of your own:  use as much paraphrasing as possible. As stated in Wikipedia, sources are considered reliable when they are written by and then peer-reviewed by experts in a field of study (para 2). Sources are considered reliable when they are written by and then peer-reviewed by experts in a field of study (Wikipedia para 2).

The sentence with the sourced material in it is the meat of the source sandwich.  However, the sentences before and after it are your bread/bun.   

Just as a sandwich has three parts—bread, filling, bread—so the source sandwich method gives three steps to incorporating a quotation, paraphrase, summary, or statistic effectively into your body-paragraph.

(NOTE: this—sandwich—is not the WHOLE paragraph. The sandwich is simply a section within the body-paragraph.  It is the section of the body-paragraph that DEFENDS the sub-point being asserted by the topic sentence.)

STEP 3—the bottom bun—is the most important part, but please note that anytime you use outside source material in your writing—no matter if it is presented as a quote, summary, or paraphrase—you must include step 1 and step 3 to encapsulate the source (the meat).  Otherwise, you are simply creating an essay stacked with source content and your voice will not be present. 

YOU WILL ALSO NOTICE A REDUCTION IN OVERALL POINTS—because your sources are LEADING the writing, not you.  YOU must LEAD the writing and only use sources strategically to defend your assertions.