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Civil & Environmental Engineering 103: Citation tools

Resources and tips for citations in blogging.

How to cite in Chicago (author-date) style

Website
Format:
Author Last, First. Year of Publication. "Title of Page." Title of Site. Last modified or Accessed Month Day, Year. URL.
Sample Citation:
Sun, Yee-Fan. 2005. "Shacking Up." DigsMagazine.com. Accessed March 2, 2005.
     http://www.digsmagazine.com/lounge/lounge_shackingup.htm.

Newspaper article online
Format:
Author Last, First. Year of Publication. “Title.” Newspaper Name, Month Day of Publication. URL.
Sample Citation:
Mapes, Lynda V. 2005. “Unearthing Tse-whit-zen.” Seattle Times, May 25.
     http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/news/local/klallam/index.html.

Magazine article online
Format:
Author Last, First. Year of Publication. “Title.” Magazine Name, Month Day. URL.
Sample Citation:
Leonard, Andrew. 2005. “Embracing the Dark Side of the Brand.” Salon, May 18.
     http://www.salon.com/mwt/feature/2005/05/18/star_wars_lego/index.np.html.

Journal article online
Format:
Author Last, First. Year of Pub. “Title.” Journal Name volume # (issue #): inclusive page numbers if available. URL or doi number.
Sample Citation:
Ferrell, Robert H. 1990. “Truman's Place in History.” Reviews in American History 18 (1): 1-9. http://www.jstor.org/stable/2702718.

Book
Format:
Author Last, First. Year of Pub. Title. Location of Publisher: Publisher.
Sample Citation:
Welch, Kathleen E. 1999. Electric Rhetoric: Classical Rhetoric, Oralism, and a New Literacy. Cambridge: MIT Press.

eBook
Format:
Author Last, First. Year of Publication. Title. Location of Publisher: Publisher. URL.
Sample Citation:
Welch, Kathleen E. 1999. Electric Rhetoric: Classical Rhetoric, Oralism, and a New Literacy. Cambridge: MIT Press. 
     http://www.netlibrary.com.

Examples from Trinity University Chicago Citation Style Guide. More examples and more in-depth information about Chicago style (and MLA and APA) can be found at the Purdue Online Writing Lab. 

Citation tools

There are many tools that can help you instantly create formatted citations in a citation style of your choosing. Note that these programs are often created for use with Word or other word processing software - you may need to do some additional formatting before publishing your post.

We recommend the following free tools: 

  • Zotero
    It's easy to learn and setup, and can help you with citations in other classes as well. Add websites, books or articles into your Zotero library and then select which ones you want to cite - Zotero can generate one list ready for copy and pasting.
  • citethisforme.com
    Simple citation generator for individual citations. Enter the article title, book title, or website address you want to cite and the website will format for you in Chicago (author-date style), APA or MLA.
  • NCSU Libraries Citation Builder
    Requires more work than the other tools - you must fill in publication information including author, date, publication, title, etc. - but is excellent if citethisforme isn't working for you.