Academic disciplines have varying expectations about how reference data is listed. In some cases, up to two magazines in the same field use different styles. This guide covers the three main styles used in Yale. All three of these styles require the same basic knowledge, but their order varies in part because different academic fields emphasize different elements of the source when referring to previous research. The first two styles are called in-text citation styles, which means you provide some information about the source immediately after the offer, but leave the rest in the list of citations (APAs) or mentioned.
- Works at the end of the paper: (1) The MLA style, distinct by the modern language union, is the most common in the humanities. Because humanities studies highlight how, one writing affects another, the MLA style emphasizes the author’s name and page in the original text you use. This information allows researchers to easily trace your exact sentences that you are analyzing. (2) The APA style defined by the American Psychological Association is the most common in the social sciences. While the author’s name is an important part of APA citations, this style emphasizes the year of publication of the source rather than the page number, allowing the reader to quickly see how the research you are writing has evolved over time.
- An alternative to textual content is to use footnotes that provide source information at the bottom of the page. The footnote style we show here is called the Chicago style as defined by the University of Chicago. The Chicago style is especially popular in historical research. When a historical explanation is developed from multiple primary sources, the use of footnotes instead of the addition of enclosed information allows the reader to focus on the evidence rather than the publication information interfering with that evidence. Footnotes can be viewed if someone wants to trace your source for further investigation.
- The Chicago style is more flexible than the MLA and APA formats, and therefore more complex to explain. See the notes on Chicago style footnotes for more information on treating Chicago style in this guide. Each of these three styles has a different practice of how to refer to the source in the paper body. See Signal Sources in the Paper Body for more information.
- Note: Some books written in MLA or APA style also include so-called discursive footnotes. Instead of giving only the author and title of the sources, these notes address in a sentence or two some aspects of the evidence that are not part of the main argument of the paper. Discursive footnotes are also welcome in Chicago style, and many papers that use Chicago style footnotes confuse discursive footnotes with others that only provide bibliographic information. See where to mention for more information on such a footnote.
- You should check with your instructors for the style they want you to wear. If you are unsure, remember that the purpose of the references is to help the reader who wants to know your sources directly. Enter enough information to make the search easy. The examples below are correct and may be cited as guides in the citation of your source. But the examples do not always emphasize very small variations in form between styles (for example, whether a colon or parentheses are used to distinguish a number from a quarterly issue number). More information on each of these referencing styles can be found on the websites listed below.
