To avoid plagiarism and violation of the University's Academic Honesty Policy (printed in The Source), indicate exactly where ideas, facts, or information came from. As you are reading and taking notes, keep track of your sources. Although information recorded will vary with the source you are using, the basic information you will need includes:
Author (if identified)
Title of the work (both article and journal title if appropriate)
Publication date (with place and publisher name for books)
Page (where you found a specific idea/fact, as well as the pagination of an article)
The rules for citing electronic sources are slightly different. In general, the information you will need includes:
Author (if identified) and/or sponsoring organization
Title of page/document
Type of source (Web, e-mail, ftp, etc)
URL of source
Date of download/viewing (Important in a constantly changing electronic source. Information you quote today may not be there when your instructor looks tomorrow. Some instructors are requiring printouts of electronic resources cited, as proof of their existence. Check with your instructor.)NOTE: You must use the format for an electronic source when you are using the online version of a printed journal article (full text from Academic Search Elite or Expanded Academic ASAP, for example).
There are printed and online guides to help you construct your bibliography correctly. Check with your instructor to see if there is a specific guide you should use. Printed style manuals are available in the Mortensen Library’s Reference collection. Click here for titles and call numbers. You may want to consider purchasing a copy of the manual you use most often.
Examples of how to cite basic types of sources in APA and MLA format are available here.
Links to selected online guides are available from the Web Reference Tools.
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