General guidelines for Chicago notes and bibliography

• Indent the first line of each note one-half inch. Place the note number on the line (not raised), followed by a period.
• Begin the first line of each bibliography entry at the left margin. Indent additional lines of the entry one-half inch.

• In each note, give the authors’ names in normal order, first name followed by middle and last names.
• In the bibliography, invert the first author’s name—last name first followed by a comma and the first and middle names. Give all other authors in normal order. Use the word “and” before the last author’s name.
• Arrange the bibliography alphabetically by authors’ last names or by titles for works with no authors.

• In titles of works, capitalize all words except articles (a, an, the), prepositions (to, from, between, and so on), coordinating conjunctions (and, but, or, nor, for, so, yet), and to and as—unless one of these words is first or last in the title or subtitle. Follow these guidelines in your paper even if the title is styled differently in the source.
• Italicize titles of books and other long works.
• Use quotation marks for titles of articles and other short works.

• In the notes, give the place, publisher, and date in parentheses, followed by a comma and the page number (where one is available).
• In the bibliography, give the place, publisher, and date without parentheses, followed by a period.
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  Use a state abbreviation with the city only if the city is not well known or could be confused with another city. Omit the state if it is part of the publisher’s name (University of Nebraska Press, for instance). Always use “DC” with the city Washington.
• If the source does not give a city of publication, use the abbreviation “N.p.” (for “No place”).
• Shorten publishers’ names, usually to the first principal word (“Wiley” for “John Wiley and Sons,” for instance). Omit “Company” and “Inc.,” but do not omit “Press” or “Books” as part of the name.

• List a sponsor or a publisher for most Web sites, but not for online journals, magazines, or newspapers.
• For a work found in a database, give the title of the database, but not a sponsor.

• For a print source, the date of publication is the most recent date on the title page or the copyright page.
• For a Web source, use the copyright date or the most recent modified (update) date. If a source does not have a date, give the date you accessed the site (“accessed August 11, 2014”).
• For books and for most journals, use the year of publication.
• For monthly magazines, use the month and the year. Do not abbreviate the month.
• For weekly magazines and newspapers, give the month, day, and year in that order: February 16, 2014. Do not abbreviate the month.
• If there is no date of publication or update, use “n.d.” (for “no date”).

• For a journal, give volume and issue numbers if the journal has both. Use the abbreviation “no.” before the issue number.
• When an article appears on consecutive pages, provide the range of pages. When an article in a database or on the Web shows only a beginning page, use a plus sign after the page number: 21+.

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  Some sources, typically periodical articles, use a permanent locator called a digital object identifier (DOI). Use the DOI, when it is available, in place of a URL in citations of sources from the Web.
• For sources from a database, provide one of the following pieces of information, as available, in this order of preference: a DOI; the name of the database and document number; or a “stable” or “persistent” URL for the source.
• If your word processing program automatically turns URLs and DOIs into hot links (by underlining them and highlighting them in color), usually you should turn off this feature. Some instructors, however, may prefer that you provide live links in papers submitted electronically. Check with your instructor if you are unsure of the requirements in your course.