Hi,

If i have a direct quotation starting three lines of which is at the bottom of a page then it continues on another page, will that be right? Or should a direct quote be in one chunk on one page? (I'm using Harvard style if it matters.)

Also, what about tables? I keep reading a table should be whole on the same, page. Now this makes sense but what about the empty space I end up with when I push a table down by 'Enter' to keep it fully on one page? Is this space permitted?
Thanks!
:-)

Hi Lania,

I think it's difficult to advise you without knowing what your university guidelines are, if you log on to your student portal and search for reference guide you should be able to find referencing guidelines specific for your uni. I would say the quotation should all be in one chunk, on one page, as it looks neater, but I don't think they're going to penalise you for it not being all on one page. I think split over two pages is preferable to a big chunk of empty page!

As for the table, can you have the table all in one piece but type around it? It doesn't matter if the table isn't directly below where you refer to it, many text books don't have the table directly after mentioning it, nor do journal articles.

I think it might be worth having a word with your supervisor about this too, just to make sure! They should know what is acceptable.

I went with the option of having all of a graph on one page (which we were told to do in university regulations) and haivng empty spaces if needed to push a table or graph onto the next page. I did this as we were told to only have one table or graph on any one page and if I had filled all the space with text this wouldnot have been possible. Neither my examiners nor my supervisors commented on the empty space and I think it looks ok on the print out.

Thank you both.
Well, I first used Lindalou's style and had the tables running on the top of the pages with text completing the rest of the pages regardless to the position of the text referring to the table, but the whole thing became very difficult to follow up and very inconvenient. I now moved the tables just after they are mentioned and just before the table description. This created the spaces I have mentioned. So according to Catalinbold it is fine. The only thing is that at a point, I have several small tables with short descriptions following; and sometimes two tables happen to be on the same page.

In an ideal world the tables would be complete on just one page as would quotations. I had to re-format my thesis to avoid breaking tables so would space the text evenly on the page rather than a great big blank gap. This may have meant bringing the next paragraph onto this page so that the table would sit nicely on the next page. I didn't necessarily have the table on the same page as the reference to it, it may have been on the next page. Where I had a lot of figures or tables in one chapter I kept the key ones in the chapter and had to put the others into an appendix together otherwise the text would have been broken up by too many illustrations. Another suggestion (which I kind of did aswell) was to have the text on one page followed by a page or two of tables/figures followed by text again. Hope this helps.