What is a citation and citation style?

A citation is a way of giving credit to

individuals for their creative and
intellectual works that you utilized to
support your research. It can also be
used to locate particular sources and
combat plagiarism. Typically, a citation
can include the author's name, date,
location of the publishing company,
journal title, or DOI (Digital Object
Identifer).
A citation style dictates the information
necessary for a citation and how the
information is ordered, as well as
punctuation and other formatting.
How to do I choose a citation style?
There are many different ways of citing
resources from your research. The
citation style sometimes depends on the
academic discipline involved. For
example:
APA (American Psychological
Association) is used by Education,
Psychology, and Sciences
MLA (Modern Language Association)
style is used by the Humanities
 Chicago/Turabian style is generally
used by Business, History, and the
Fine Arts

What is APA Style?

APA (American Psychological
Association) Style originated in 1929,
when a group of psychologists,
anthropologists, and business managers
convened and sought to establish a
simple set of procedures, or style rules,
that would codify the many components of
scientific writing to increase the ease of
reading comprehension.
As with other editorial styles, APA Style
consists of rules or guidelines that a
publisher observes to ensure clear and
consistent presentation of written
material. It concerns uniform use of such
elements as selection of headings, tone,
and length, punctuation and
abbreviations, presentation of numbers
and statistics, construction of tables and
figures, citation of references, and many
other elements that are a part of a
manuscript. (Source: Official APA
website)
In-text Citation with APA
The APA style calls for three kinds of
information to be included in in-text
citations. Theauthor's last name and the
work's date of publication must always
appear, and these items must match
exactly the corresponding entry in the
references list. The third kind of
information, the page number, appears
only in a citation to a direct quotation.
....(Crockatt, 1995).
Direct quote from the text
"The potentially contradictory nature of
Moscow's priorities surfaced first in its
policies towards East Germany and
Yugoslavia," (Crockatt, 1995, p. 1).
Major Citations for a Reference
List/Bibliography
Note: All second and third lines in the APA
Bibliography should be indented.
 Materi Reference List/Bibliography
al
Type
A Baxter, C. (1997). Race equality in
book health care and
in education. Philadelphia: Ballière
print
Tindall.
A Haybron, D. M. (2008). Philosophy
book and the science of subjective well-
chapte being. In M. Eid & R. J. Larsen
r, print
versio
(Eds.), The science of subjective
n well-being (pp. 17-43). New York,
NY: Guilford Press.
An Millbower, L. (2003). Show biz
eBook training: Fun and effective
business training techniques from
the worlds of stage, screen, and
song. Retrieved from
http://www.amacombooks.org/
An Alibali, M. W. (1999). How children
article change their minds: Strategy
in a change can be gradual or
print
journal
abrupt. Developmental
Psychology, 35, 127-145.
An Carter, S., & Dunbar-Odom, D.
article (2009). The converging literacies
in a center: An integrated model for
journal
withou
writing programs. Kairos: A
t DOI Journal of Rhetoric, Technology,
and Pedagogy, 14(1), 38-48.
 Retrieved from
http://kairos.technorhetoric.net/
An Gaudio, J. L., & Snowdon, C. T.
article (2008). Spatial cues more salient
in a than color cues in cotton-top
journal
with
tamarins (saguinus oedipus)
DOI reversal learning. Journal of
 Comparative Psychology,
122, 441-444. doi: 10.1037/0735-
7036.122.4.441
Websit The World Famous Hot Dog
es - Site. (1999, July 7). Retrieved
profes January 5, 2008, from
sional
or
person http://www.xroads.com/~tcs/hotdo
al g/hotdog.html
sites
Websit U.S. Department of Justice. (2006,
es - September 10). Trends in violent
online victimization by age, 1973-2005.
govern
ment
Retrieved from
public http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/glanc
ations e/vage.htm
Emails According to preservationist J.
(cited Mohlhenrich (personal
in-text communication, January 5, 2008).
only)
Mailin Stein, C.(2006, January
g Lists 5). Chessie rescue - Annapolis,
(listser MD [Message posted to Chessie-
v)
L electronic mailing list]. Retrieved
 from http://chessie-l-
[email protected]
Radio DeFord, F. (Writer). (2007, August
and TV 8). Beyond Vick: Animal cruelty for
episod sport [Television series episode].
es -
from
In NPR (Producer), Morning
library
databa Edition. Retrieved from Academic
ses OneFile database.
Radio Sepic, M. (Writer). (2008). Federal
and TV prosecutors eye MySpace bullying
episod case [Television series episode].
es -
from
In NPR (Producer), All Things
Considered. Retrieved from
websit http://www.npr.org/templates/story
e /
Film Kaufman, J.C. (Producer), Lacy,
Clips L. (Director), & Hawkey, P.
from (Writer). (1979). Mean Joe
websit
e
Greene [video file]. Retrieved from
 http://memory.loc.gov/mbrs/ccmp/
meanjoe_01g.ram
Film Greene, C. (Producer), del Toro,
G.(Director). (2015). Crimson
peak [Motion picture]. United
States: Legendary Pictures.
Photo Close, C.
graph (2002). Ronald. [photograph].
(from Museum of Modern Art, New York,
book,
magaz
NY. Retrieved from
ine or http://www.moma.org/collection/ob
webpa ject.php?object_id=108890
ge)
Artwor Clark, L. (c.a. 1960's). Man with
k- Baby. [photograph]. George
from Eastman House, Rochester, NY.
library
databa
Retrieved from ARTstor
se
Artwor Close, C.
k- (2002). Ronald. [photograph].
from Museum of Modern Art, New York.
websit Retrieved from
e http://www.moma.org/collection/br
owse_results.php?
object_id=108890
 What is MLA Style?
MLA (Modern Language Association)
style for documentation is widely used in
the humanities, especially in writing on
language and literature. MLA style
features brief parenthetical citations in
the text keyed to an alphabetical list of
works cited that appears at the end of the
work. (Source: Official MLA website)

Core Elements
Each entry in the list of works
cited is composed of facts
common to most works—the MLA core
 elements. They are assembled in a
specific order.
Containers
The concept of containers is crucial to
MLA style. When the source being
documented forms part of a larger whole,
the larger whole can be thought of as a
container that holds the source. For
example, a short story may be contained
in an anthology. The short story is the
source, and the anthology is the
container.
Rationale
The Modern Language Association, the
authority on research and writing, takes a
fresh look at documenting sources in the
eighth edition of the MLA Handbook.
Works are published today in a dizzying
range of formats. A book, for example,
may be read in print, online, or as an e-
book--or perhaps listened to in an audio
version. On the Web, modes of
publication are regularly invented,
combined, and modified. Previous
editions of the MLA Handbook provided
separate instructions for each format,
and additional instructions were required
for new formats. In this groundbreaking
new edition of its best-selling handbook,
the MLA recommends instead one
universal set of guidelines, which writers
can apply to any type of source. Shorter
and redesigned for easy use, the eighth
edition of the MLA Handbook guides
writers through the principles behind
evaluating sources for their research. It
then shows them how to cite sources in
their writing and create useful entries for
the works-cited list. More than just a new
edition, this is a new MLA style. (Source:
MLA)
 What is Chicago Style?
Chicago is a documentation syle that has
been published by the Chicago
University Press since 1906. This citation
style incorporates rules of grammar and
punctuation common in American
English. Typically, Chicago style
presents two basic documentation
systems: (1) notes and bibliography and
(2) author-date. Choosing between the
two often depends on subject matter and
the nature of sources cited, as each
system is favored by different groups of
scholars.
The notes and bibliography style is
preferred by many in the humanities,
including those in literature, history, and
the arts. This style presents bibliographic
information in notes and, often, a
bibliography.
Materi Notes/Bibliography Style
al
Type
A Note Style: 1. Michael
book Pollan, The Omnivore's Dilemma:
in A Natural History of Four
print
Meals (New York: Penguin,
2006), 99–100.
Duplicate Note: 2.
Pollan, Omnivore's Dilemma, 3.
Bibliography: Pollan,
Michael. The Omnivore's
Dilemma: A Natural History of
 Four Meals. New York: Penguin,
2006.
An Note Style: 1. Joshua I.
article Weinstein, "The Market in
in a Plato’s Republic," Classical
print Philology 104 (2009): 440.
journa Duplicate Note: 2. Weinstein,
l "Plato’s Republic," 452–53.
Bibliography: Weinstein, Joshua
I. "The Market in
Plato’s Republic." Classical
Philology 104 (2009): 439–58.
An Note Style: 1. Gueorgi Kossinets
article and Duncan J. Watts, “Origins of
in an Homophily in an Evolving Social
electro Network,” American Journal of
nic Sociology 115 (2009): 411,
journa accessed February 28, 2010,
l doi:10.1086/599247.
Duplicate Note: Kossinets and
Watts, “Origins of Homophily,”
439.
Bibliography: Kossinets, Gueorgi,
and Duncan J. Watts. “Origins of
Homophily in an Evolving Social
Network.” American Journal of
 Sociology 115 (2009): 405–50.
Accessed February 28, 2010.
doi:10.1086/599247.
A Note Style: 1.“Google Privacy
websit Policy,” last modified March 11,
e 2009,
http://www.google.com/intl/en/priv
acypolicy.html.
Duplicate Note: “Google Privacy
Policy.”
Bibliography: Google. “Google
Privacy Policy.” Last modified
March 11, 2009.
 http://www.google.com/intl/en/priv
acypolicy.html.

The author-date style has long been

used by those in the physical, natural,
and social sciences. In this system,
sources are briefly cited in the text,
usually in parentheses, by author’s last
name and date of publication. The short
citations are amplified in a list of
references, where full bibliographic
information is provided.
Autho In- Bibliography
r/Date text
Style Citati
on
A book (Polla Pollan, Michael. 2006. The
n Omnivore’s Dilemma: A
2006,
 99– Natural History of Four
100) Meals. New York: Penguin.
An (Wein Weinstein, Joshua I. 2009.
article stein “The Market in
in a 2009, Plato’s Republic.” Classical
print 440) Philology 104:439–58.
journal
An (Koss Kossinets, Gueorgi, and
article inets Duncan J. Watts. 2009.
in an and “Origins of Homophily in an
electro Watts Evolving Social
nic 2009, Network.” American
journal 411) Journal of
Sociology115:405–50.
 Accessed February 28,
2010. doi:10.1086/599247.
A (Goo Google. 2009. “Google
websit gle Privacy Policy.” Last
e 2009) modified March 11.
http://www.google.com/intl/
en/privacypolicy.html.
(Source: Official Chicago Manual
website)