Citation and Plagiarism

Chicago Humanities Style

This guide is intended as a general introduction to citing sources using the bibliographic style established by the Chicago Manual of Style.

Note that this manual also includes essential information on research and writing, and manuscript preparation (e.g., margins, use of the passive voice). There are two Chicago Style formats: Humanities style (using footnotes) and Author-Date style (using in-text citations). This guide is for the Humanities style, favored by writers in history and art history. Chicago Style is mostly interchangeable with Turabian, a modified version of this style.

General Guidelines

• In works with no bibliography, give full details at the first mention of a work cited; in a work with a bibliography, the note citations can be concise.
• During your research, develop a consistent system for noting bibliographic information (author, title, date, publisher, source, page numbers) and keep it with your notes or copies of the source material you used.
• Always consult your professor/department/publisher for specific requirements.
• Include as much of the requested information as is available. The most important thing about a footnote or bibliographic entry is that the reader can use it to find the item being cited.

Footnote Guidelines

• The first time you cite a source, the note should include publication information for that work as well as the page number on which the passage being cited may be found. For subsequent references to a source you have already cited, give only the author's last name, a short form of the title, and the page or pages cited. A short form of the title of a book is italicized; a short form of the title of an article is put in quotation marks. E.g:
  First: Peter Burchard, One Gallant Rush: Robert Gould Shaw and His Brave Black Regiment (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1965), 85.
  Subsequent: Burchard, One Gallant Rush, 31.
• When one work by the same person is cited successively, Ibid. ("in the same place") may be used, with a page number.

Sample List of Entries

Chicago has a different format for footnotes and bibliographic entries. Below are formats for both types of citation, with "N" indicating an example for a footnote and "B" indicating an example of a bibliographic entry. For citation-styles of genres not included here, please see the Chicago Manual of Style.