Citing and Referencing 2 minute basics Information Service & Library

Plagiarism is a form of intellectual theft. It includes: Presenting the work of another student as if it were your own. Submitting collaborative work - unless this is specifically permitted. Submitting the same piece of work for two different assignments. Copying sections of another's work but changing the odd word or phrase i.e. selective or poor paraphrasing or patchwriting.  It is plagiarism - even if it is accidental.

How to avoid plagiarism   Careful note taking - keep track of all your sources. When paraphrasing make this clear and use a citation. When “quoting directly” make it clear and use a citation. Allow plenty of time for writing and adding references. Always cite and reference all your sources. If you did not write it …then you must cite it!

Note taking - be methodical record all sources   Take thorough notes and record the item details: title, author, date, edition, page numbers. Record the full details: urls and date accessed of web items.  Ensure you know exactly which portions you have copied verbatim. Being systematic saves time in the long run

You must always cite quotations Quoting   If you are using short quotes in the author's exact words - place them in “quotation marks.” For longer quotations - separate the text and indent it from the left-hand margin. No need to use quotation marks. You must always cite quotations

Citing and referencing quotations:

Citing and referencing   Citing - where you refer to the source in the body of your writing. References - the list at the end of your writing supplying source details. You must reference all written materials including websites, e-mails, tweets, blogs, discussion lists, databases, slide decks, lecture notes, etc. Bibliography - a list of all the sources consulted - used or not. The term Bibliography is sometimes used interchangeably with Reference List. You do not need to reference common knowledge i.e. Facts that you may readily assume that your readers will know.

Citation styles   Unless told otherwise use the Harvard Style. This is an in text style and does not use superscript with footnotes. Detailed guidance is on the Libguides pages: Citing and Referencing London.libguides.com - top tab: Citing and Referencing

Specific guidance   Our Libguide page gives general guidance on how to reference in the Harvard style. It also gives specific example of the correct formatting for common materials: books, reports, journals, websites, cases, images etc.

Our students may not use Turnitin to check their work. Plagiarism detection   The School uses Turnitin software. Turnitin identifies identical passages from published works, the web and student assignments. A high similarity score is not necessarily an indication of plagiarism. Citing and referencing properly will often lower a high similarity score. Our students may not use Turnitin to check their work.

Getting Harvard Style References from Library e-resources

To download a number of references from SUMMON.   Run your search in SUMMON and select readings from your results list by clicking on the briefcase icon. This will add them to your folder - top right. Click there to retrieve them.

Google Scholar references   Go to Google Scholar on the Library home page and search. The quotation mark icon will export a single reference: To save a number of items – click on the star icon. Then go to My Library - top right of page. Re-select the items you want and Export.

Citing while you write in Word Word offers a “cite while you write” option - go to the References Tab: When writing - when you need to insert an in text citation click on: Insert Citation. You will have to “add new source” and fill in the fields. As you must enter the data this method suits a small number of references . At the end click on Bibliography. This inserts a bibliography of all the items you have cited in author surname order.  

Reference Management Software   Use RMS such as: Zotero, Mendley and Endnote to manage large numbers of references. They save, organise, de-duplicate and let you share bibliographic records. You can import records directly from database searches. You can choose different referencing styles (Harvard, NLA, MLA etc.) Zotero is free open source software – so you can use it after graduating

The Zotero support pages will get you started. Using Zotero https://www.zotero.org/support/ The Zotero support pages will get you started. .

See our Training & Help pages for the next Zotero training session We are here to help - please get in touch: Library@london.edu End