I have always struggled somewhat with using quotations effectively. I find the shift between my words and someone else’s to be jarring, even while writing them. Of course, I understand how the inclusion of quotations makes a person’s writing more effective, but it has always felt as though I was interrupting the flow of my thoughts in order to complete a quota. There is also the underlying sense that, perhaps, I am misusing a person’s words, disrespecting them, even. I know I am made uneasy by the idea of somebody quoting me in their work, especially if my words are taken out of context. For this reason, the “orphan” approach to quotation suggested by Graff and Birkenstein landed with me particularly well. “In a way, quotations are like orphans”, they write, “words that have been taken from their original contexts and that need to be integrated into their new textual surroundings” (43). I take the implication here to be that a writer is quite literally taking in these orphaned passages as their own. I think that, were I to reframe my understanding of quotation to be more in line with that of this excerpt, the strange discomforts I feel towards the practice will be lessened. I must remember that I am not simply adapting another person’s words, but adopting them.