Citing Sources
What is a citation?
Citing a source means that you show, within the body of your text, that you took words, ideas, figures, images, etc. from another place. They are a short way to uniquely identify a published work (e.g. book, article, chapter, web site). They are found in bibliographies and reference lists and are also collected in article and book databases.
Citations consist of standard elements, and contain all the information necessary to identify and track down publications, including:
- author name(s)
- titles of books, articles, and journals
- date of publication
- page numbers
- volume and issue numbers (for articles)
Learn more about citing your sources in APA, Chicago, and MLA in the Citation Styles Guide.
Citation Management Software
Zotero is a free citation management software that is used to collect, organize, cite, and store research from all types of sources. Learn more about using Zotero for citation management in the Zotero Guide.
