Refugees and Forced Migration: Subject Guide: Citation Help

Whenever you quote or base your ideas on another person's work, you must document the source you used. Even when you do not quote directly from another work, if reading that source contributed to the ideas presented in your paper, you must give the author(s) proper credit.

Citations allow readers to:

• locate and further explore the sources you consulted;
• show the depth and scope of your research, and
• give credit to authors for their ideas.

Think of documenting your sources as providing a trail for your reader to follow to see the research you performed and discover what led you to your original contribution.

Failing to do so constitutes plagarism, which comes with serious academic consequences. As you gather sources, make sure you have all the information you need to cite a source, even if you're not 100% sure you'll use the source.

View this guide, Giving Credit Where Credit is Due, to learn more about why and how to cite sources.

There are several citation styles appropriate for writing papers in Religious Studies, depending on the area of research in which you are writing. Ask your professor if you don't know which style to use.

The following print style guides are available in the University Library. Click on the title to determine where the book is shelved. Some books may be in the Reference Stacks on the 2nd floor of Library North, while others will be in the General Collection.

Zotero is a free, easy-to-use, open source tool to help you collect, organize, cite, and share your research sources. Originally created to work only with the Firefox browser, it can now be used with Chrome, Safari, and Opera (with the appropriate connector).

See the library's Zotero information page for help and useful tips. For additional information, see the Zotero website.

EndNote is a program for managing bibliographic citations. It can automate much of the work of organizing and formatting citations and bibliographies in your writing. EndNote can connect to online sources such as GIL and article databases, output results in over 1,000 different bibliographic styles, and more.

Please see the library's EndNote information page for information on how to download and use the software.

Don't want to download the software? Use EndNoteWeb, the Web-based version that allows you to access your citations from any computer, any where, any time. .