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Is it an Article, a Book, or a Chapter in a Book? Identifying Citations: Books

No matter what style manual you are following (APA, MLA, etc.), you will need to learn how to recognize the three basic types of citations. #citations #bibliography #article #book #chapter

 

Decorative header.

Walking with the Great Apes

A BOOK CITATION: ELEMENTS IDENTIFIED

This color-coded guide identifies the elements that make up a book citation.  Notice how the arrangement of the very same elements changes depending on where you are viewing it as demonstrated in the following screenshots and photos of the actual book.

 

Montgomery, S. (1991). Walking with the great apes: Jane Goodall, Dian Fossey, Beruté Galdikas. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Co.

 

Montgomery, S. (1991). Walking with the great apes: Jane GoodallDian FosseyBeruté Galdikas. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Co.

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COLOR KEY

AUTHOR(S)  Montgomery, S.

TITLE OF BOOK  Walking with the great apes: Jane Goodall, Dian Fossey, Beruté Galdikas.

PLACE OF PUBLICATION  Boston, MA:

PUBLISHER  Houghton Mifflin Co.

DATE  (1991)

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HINTS - BOOKS

  • Always have a place of publication and a publisher.

A BOOK CITATION AS IT APPEARS IN A DATABASE LIST OF RESULTS

The book citation in the example above as it appears in a database list of results:

Screenshot of book citation in list of results.

A BOOK CITATION AS IT APPEARS ON A DATABASE DETAIL SCREEN

Clicking on the title takes you to the database detail screen where the book citation appears again:

Screenshot of book citation on detail screen.

A BOOK CITATION FROM THE BOOK ITSELF

THE FRONT OF THE TITLE PAGE

Everything needed to make a complete citation for this book is on the title page except the year of publication.

Front of title page.

 

THE BACK OF THE TITLE PAGE

The year of publication is on the back of the title page (highlighted here in red).

Back of the title page.

Thin orange line.