Knowing which sources to acknowledge

Page contents:

  • 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—to use formal citations when called for in college work and to acknowledge your sources in other appropriate ways for writing that follows different conventions.

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Materials that do not require acknowledgment

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.

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Tutorial: Do I need to cite that?