Extract
A passage selected from a longer text and quoted as a self-contained unit.
An extract is a piece of a text lifted out of its surrounding context and presented as a quotation. Unlike an excerpt, which is usually a longer sample, an extract can be a single sentence or a paragraph chosen for its own force.
The term is common in legal, literary, and scholarly publishing: 'The extract below shows the defendant's intent.' Because the extract is separated from its source, it must carry enough information for a reader to find the original — title, author, date, page or location.
The danger of the extract is the danger of all quotation: the shorter the piece, the more the surrounding context is doing work that the reader no longer sees. A cruel extract can make a generous writer look cruel; a hopeful extract can make a despairing one look hopeful.
Common mistake: presenting an extract without a locator. A quotation that cannot be checked is an anecdote, not evidence.
“The law, in its majestic equality, forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges...”
Keep reading the glossary
A passage repeated verbatim from a written or spoken source, with attribution.
A formal reference that lets a reader locate the source of a quote.
Word-for-word — quoting exactly as the original was spoken or written.
A long quotation set off as its own indented paragraph, without quotation marks.