IPOL Writing Guide

What is a Citation?

A citation is how you tell your readers that certain ideas or material in your writing came from someone else - another source. Citations also provide your reader with all the information they need to find the source that you used.

Why Cite?

It is really important to cite your sources as it:

• helps you to avoid plagiarism (passing off someone's else ideas as your own);
• shows how much research you have done; and
• strengthens your argument and provides credibility to your work.

When Should I Cite?

You need to cite whenever you use someone else's ideas, words or other media (such as a videos, blogs, speeches, pictures) 

How do I Cite?

The way that you cite depends on the citation style. The citation style refers to how the information about the source is ordered as well as punctuation and formatting. There are a number of different citation styles. The ones used at GUQ are APA, MLA and Chicago.

When you write a paper you will have an in-text citation and a reference list/bibliography. The in-text citation is the parenthetical citation in your paper. If you use APA, the in-text citation would contain the author's name, date of publication and the page number if you quoted from a source. The reference list appears at the end of the paper and provides all the bibliographic information about the source. 

Find out what citation style your professor would like you to use and refer to the appropriate citation style section in this guide to help you cite correctly.