How to cite in essay

How to cite in essay

Source identification is key to academic and other writings. Not citing sources used is an academic offense known as plagiarism. In most cases, the topic you are to write on has been researched, discussed and criticized by other authors. Maybe you are giving it a different approach but you borrow ideas which you should indicate as not your own opinion.

There are different citing techniques based on the referencing styles which include APA, MLA, Chicago, Harvard, Turabian and Vancouver among others.

6 tips to getting your citation right

-Identify the type of referencing style to use. For example, you can use MLA

-Know the subject and align your referencing to it. An example is that medical subjects mostly use the Vancouver method while social sciences would prefer the APA. Carefully understand your subject area.

-Read the course instructions and marking criteria and follow it.

-Use only one form of citation in the text and referencing page. Avoid mixing the referencing styles. For instance, if the essay requires you to use Harvard use it and know its requirements.

-Avoid long and direct quotations. This makes your work redundant. Borrow ideas and merge it to your thoughts.

-Maximize on paraphrasing other authors’ work rather than quoting directly.

To make your citing process easy, ensure that you reference your work as you write. Information arise from diverse sources such as journal articles, books, newspapers, reports, websites, electronic sources or conference proceedings. Each genre under each referencing styles has a certain way to be referenced. Thus, it is important to have prior knowledge of the style you need to use and the sources of your information.  An example of APA citation is (Knowles, 2017) and MLA is (Knowles) or MLA with page numbers is (23). The author, date or author, date, page number method varies across the different referencing styles.

Moreover, where you place the in-text citation and how you do it is also important. You may have it at the beginning of the sentence, within a paragraph or at the end of it based on where the referenced information is within your text. An APA example is, “According to Whitesand (2018), freshmen students fail English 101 due to its essay writing sections that many find it hard to crack.” On the other hand, “Many freshmen students dislike the essay writing section of English 101 (Whitesand, 2018).” Understand the best approach for you to avoid any grammar or punctuation mistakes.