Watch this video for an introduction to Citations By NCSU Libraries. CC BY NC SA 3.0.
Why Cite?
Be sure to write down as much information as you can while you are first looking at a source in case you need to view it again. Not sure where to start? Some good choices include:
1. Author or editor
2. Title of the book, OR the article AND the journal title
3. Publisher
4. Place of publication for a book OR Volume and issue number of the journal or magazine
5. Date of publication
6. URL and/or the database name
7. Date you accessed an electronic document
If you have the relevant information listed above you will be able to create your bibliography Saving this information will generally allow you to put together your reference page at the end of your paper in any format needed. When accessing material, save enough information so that you can find the material again. Since this is one primary purpose of citations, noting the following for any material you use will allow you to find it again AND cite it.
Owl Guides listed below give formulas and examples of how to cite different sources in your work cited list (reference list).
Citation Generators are web form for automatic citation generation for use in papers. My favorite is ZoteroBib
(NOTE: YOU ALWAYS HAVE TO DOUBLE CHECK CITATION GENERATOR RESULTS USING OWL GUIDES OR MLA HANDBOOK!!!!!!!)
Per Skyline College's Course Catalog, "Plagiarism is representing the work of someone else as his/her own and submitting it to fulfill academic requirements." Plagiarism is cheating and is viewed as "academic dishonesty" and therefore, "academic misconduct." For more information, see Academic Integrity/Honesty.
You have plagiarized when you...
To avoid plagiarism, you must give credit by citing sources whenever you use
another person’s idea, opinion, or theory
any facts, statistics, graphs, drawings—any pieces of information—that are not common knowledge
quotations of another person’s actual spoken or written words
paraphrase of another person’s spoken or written words
You don’t need to cite sources when the information you write about are common facts, your own original research, and/or your own opinions and evaluations.
Some tips to avoid unintentional plagiarism