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HIS 102: History of Western Civilization II (Campbell-Loudoun)

This guide has been created by librarians to help you find books, articles, videos, and other types of resources related to this program of study. Direct comments to Julie Combs, jcombs@nvcc.edu.

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Why and When to Cite

Why to Cite:

  • Give credit to the authors of the sources you used.
  • Provide evidence you did research -- good, credible sources give your work more authority.
  • Allows your reader to locate the sources you used.
  • Avoid plagiarism.

When to Cite:

You should cite a source if you reproducequoteparaphrase, or summarize ideas and/or media created by other individuals. When in doubt, cite!

A Note for Chicago Citations

Chicago Manual of Style gives writers two different methods for documenting sources: the Author-Date System and the Notes-Bibliography (NB) System. As its name suggests, Author-Date uses parenthetical citations in the text to reference the source's author's last name and the year of publication. Each parenthetical citation corresponds to an entry on a References page that concludes the document. 

By contrast, NB uses numbered footnotes in the text to direct the reader to a shortened citation at the bottom of the page. This corresponds to a fuller citation on a Bibliography page that concludes the document. Though the general principles of citation are the same here, the citations themselves are formatted differently from the way they appear in Author-Date.

Make sure you are using the same citation methods throughout your research assignments.