Conventions for citing sources
Materials that do not require acknowledgment
Materials that require acknowledgment
Now that huge amounts of reliable information are available online, conventions regarding acknowledgment, fair use, and source citation are shifting. It is still important, however, to understand the distinction between source materials that require acknowledgment and those that do not.
Conventions for citing sources
You should recognize that, although you need to prepare accurate and thorough citations for the sources you use in formal academic assignments, much of the writing you do outside of college will not require formal citations. In informal writing on social media, providing a link is often the only “citation” you need. Even in highly respected print newspapers and magazines, writers identify their sources when quoting from or summarizing them but rarely provide formal citations. Learn to be flexible—
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Materials that do not require acknowledgment
Common knowledge. If most readers know a fact, you probably do not need to cite a source for it. You do not need to credit a source to say that Barack Obama was elected president in 2008, for example.
Facts available in a wide variety of sources. If a number of encyclopedias, almanacs, reputable websites, or textbooks include a certain piece of information, you usually need not cite a specific source for it. For instance, you would not need to cite a source if you write that the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941.
Findings from field research. If you conduct observations or surveys, announce your findings as your own. Acknowledge people you interview as individuals rather than as part of a survey.
If you are not sure whether a fact, an observation, or a piece of information requires acknowledgment, err on the side of safety and cite the source.
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Materials that require acknowledgment
For material that does not fall under the preceding categories, credit sources as fully as possible. For formal writing, follow the conventions of the citation style you are using, and include each source in a bibliography or list of works cited.
Quotations, paraphrases, and summaries. Whenever you use another person’s words, ideas, or opinions, credit the source. Even though the wording of a paraphrase or summary is your own, you should still acknowledge the source.
Facts that aren’t widely known or claims that are arguable. If your readers would be unlikely to know a fact, or if an author presents as fact a claim that may or may not be true, cite the source. To claim, for instance, that Switzerland is amassing an offensive nuclear arsenal would demand a source citation because Switzerland has long been an officially neutral state. If you are not sure whether a fact will be familiar to your readers or whether a statement is arguable, go ahead and cite the source.
Images, statistics, charts, tables, graphs, and other visuals from any source. Credit all visual and statistical material not derived from your own field research, even if you create your own graph or table from the data provided in a source.
Help provided by others. If an instructor gave you a good idea or if friends responded to your draft or helped you conduct surveys, give credit, usually in a footnote that says something like “Thanks to Kiah Williams, who first suggested this connection.”
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Tutorial: Do I need to cite that?