It Makes You Sic How to Use “Sic” in Academic Writing

It Makes You Sic How to Use â€Å"Sic† in Academic Writing It Makes You Sic: How to Use â€Å"Sic† in Academic Writing Despite the best efforts of proofreaders, sometimes books are published with typographical errors. Mostly these are minor errors that don’t affect clarity, but it can be annoying if you want to quote a source in your paper and notice an error in the text. Don’t panic though, as this is where sic comes in. What Does Sic Mean? The literal meaning of the Latin term â€Å"sic† is â€Å"thus.† Nowadays, its primary use is to show that something has been written incorrectly in quoted passages. For example: According to Cameron (2013), It’s important to spell wurds [sic] correctly. Here, â€Å"[sic]† has been added to the quote because â€Å"wurds† (i.e., â€Å"words†) is spelled incorrectly. This shows your reader that the error was in the original text, not something you’ve added by mistake! When Should I  Use Sic? The short answer is â€Å"not at all if you can avoid it.† With minor errors, the best approach is usually to correct the mistake using [square brackets] to indicate the edited text. The above example, for instance, could be presented as: According to Cameron (2013), It’s important to spell [words] correctly. We use â€Å"sic† only when we want to reproduce the original text exactly, complete with errors, such as when quoting interview transcripts or sources that use archaic spellings: Wittgenstein (1953, p. 87) aimed to shew [sic] the fly the way out of the fly-bottle. Another common use of sic is to poke fun at a writer by preserving (yet pointing out) their mistakes or use of poor grammar, but this isn’t appropriate in academic writing. How to Use Sic Like all edits to quoted text, the general rule is to enclose â€Å"sic† in square brackets when inserting it into a quote, as shown above. A more controversial issue is whether or not to italicize â€Å"[sic].† Many style guides recommend using italics for non-English words, including Latin terms. But â€Å"sic† is common enough that some consider it a part of English, meaning it shouldn’t be italicized (like with â€Å"e.g.† and â€Å"etc.†). The best thing to do is check your school’s style guide for advice about italicizing Latin terms, as well as how â€Å"sic† should be used in your work.