As you write your assignment or paper, you'll be using information that you obtained from other sources and integrating it into your work. When you use someone else's words or ideas (or their pictures, charts, etc.) in your work, you must give credit to that author by citing the original source of the information.
Each source that you cite in your paper will need to be listed in two ways:
- In the text or body of your paper, an "in-text" citation
This is a very brief mention of the original information source. Often, the in-text citation includes just the author's last name and the year of publication.
- At the end of your paper
This is a complete description of the original source, which becomes part of a "Literature Cited" list or bibliography. Each reference should provide the title of the original document, the author's name, and enough other information about it so that someone would be able to locate the item, should they want to read it. Follow this link for an example.