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Citing Your Sources

Nimitz Library Research Guide

Cite a Source: How and Why You Should Do It

[Cite a Source, How and why you should do it]

Are you wondering what your professor means when she says cite your sources? The Library can help.

[example of a footnote] Most citation styles require that you include in-text citations, which may be footnotes [example of a parenthetical citation] or parenthetical citations that direct the reader towards the source of your paper's quotes or ideas.

All citation styles require a list of references [works cited example] at the end of the paper that may be called a bibliography, a works cited page, or just references. This should be a comprehensive list of all the publications and sources that you've read and used in order to draw the conclusions that you came to in your own work.

[Why should I cite my sources?]

There are a couple of reasons that you should always cite your sources. One is academic integrity. When scholars do research, they are building upon the work of other scholars. Those scholars who've provided a foundation for the work that you're doing today deserve credit for the work that they've done. Acknowledge that your ideas have proceeded from things that you have read in order to give an honest and accurate report of your own findings and conclusions.

Citing sources also lends an air of authority to your paper. Citing the work of others in your own research shows readers that you're familiar with the work of others in your field and they're more likely to trust your authority as a writer.

[Which citation style should I use?]

There a several different sets of rules for citing sources and they're all a little bit different; the professor or journal that you're writing for should specify which set of rules you should follow for your in-text citations and your list of references. Here are some basic guidelines:

• Scholars in the Humanities generally use MLA (the Modern Language Association) style guide,
• scholars in the social sciences use APA (the American Psychological Association) style guide or the Chicago manual of style.

As you're searching library and web resources for sources for your paper, you'll collect a lot of citations. It will make your life much easier if you can keep those citations organized and all in one place. [example of refworks] A citation manager like "RefWorks" can help you keep everything together, formatted correctly, and will even generate a reference list for you when you're ready to compile all those sources.

If you need help compiling a bibliography or checking your source citations, just ask a librarian. [Need more help? Ask a librarian http://www.library.uiuc.edu/askus/]