Referencing

Referencing is an important academic skill as it shows the reader of your work the sources you have used to research your topic, and gives support and weight to your arguments and conclusions. When writing an essay or thesis, referring to the sources you have used is an academic requirement. There are four good reasons for referencing;

•  To allow a reader of your work to find and check the sources you have used.
•  So that you can come back to your own work and know where you found a particular quotation or piece of information.
•  To avoid accusations of plagiarism.
•  To make you think twice about using outdated and inaccurate books, articles, or websites.

As a general rule you should not put your trust in any resource which does not give references.

Cite Them Right

The University has adopted the Cite Them Right style of referencing. According to the co-authors, Graham Shields and Richard Pears (2023a):

Referencing is the process of acknowledging other people’s work when you have used it in your assignment or research. It allows the reader to locate your source material as quickly and easily as possible so that they can read these sources themselves and verify the validity of your arguments. Referencing provides the link between what you write and the evidence on which it is based.  You identify the sources that you have used by citing them in the text of your assignment (called citations or in-text citations) and referencing them at the end of your assignment (called the reference list or end-text citations). The reference list only includes the sources cited in your text. It is not the same thing as a bibliography, which uses the same referencing style, but also includes all material, for example background readings, used in the preparation of your work.

Reference List or Bibliography - What's the difference?

Tutorial

'Cite Them Right Online' has an excellent Tutorial (Pears and Shields, 2023b) which you can sign up to as a member of the University.  This will cover all the main areas of referencing and give you a thorough grounding in the reasons for, and academic context of, referencing practice.  It is highly recommended, especially if you are newer to referencing or returning to studies.

In addition, the Academic Skills Centre has set up a self-enrol Canvas course 'Good Academic Practice' which includes material on referencing.  This is open to University of Birmingham members with their usual login details.

Referencing software

Please see Referencing Software for details of referencing software options.

Plagiarism

Plagiarism is the act of using or copying someone else's work and pretending that you thought of it or created it. In order to avoid suspicion of plagiarism it is important to make appropriate use of references.

If you are in doubt about what plagiarism is and how to avoid it you should consult your Tutor and read the University's code of practice on plagiarism.

Copyright

At present copyright law allows only small extracts of items to be copied legally provided that they are referenced properly. Only copy what is completely necessary, and only when the use falls into one or more of the following categories:

• personal private study.
• non-commercial research.
• criticism and review.
• illustration for instruction.
• parody pastiche or caricature.
• quotation.

Students’ use will fall under personal private study, criticism and review, illustration, and/or quotation. For further information, see our copyright guidance.

References

Pears, R. and Shields, G. (2023a) 'What is referencing?', in Cite Them Right Online. doi: 10.5040/9781350928060.3.

Pears, R. and Shields, G. (2023b) 'Tutorial', in Cite Them Right Online. Available at: https://www.citethemrightonline.com/tutorial (Accessed 21 November 2023)

The University provides important guidance to help you understand what plagiarism is, why it is unacceptable, and the penalties that can be incurred if you submit plagiarised work.

The library also provides guidance on how to reference correctly and how to use referencing software.

This information is additional to that which you may receive from your University department.

Information for students

• Student Conduct Office (University of Birmingham): Guidance about what plagiarism is, and how plagiarism is dealt with. Students need to understand their responsibilities regarding the submission of assessed work and the underpinning ‘Learning Agreement’
• Cite Them Right Online.  Subscription resource from Bloomsbury Publishing: login (top right) as University of Birmingham.  Source of extensive information on referencing, with tutorials and style information as well as many specific examples
• Academic Skills Gateway. Develop good academic practice and a wide range of underlying academic skills. The Academic Skills Gateway covers a host of online resources which covers learning strategies, writing, reading, revision, exam technique and more

Information for staff

• The Student Conduct Office provides information and resources for staff about plagiarism including;
  • The University's Code of Practice on Plagiarism and plagiarism regulation.
  • Standard templates for Plagiarism Offices in Colleges, Schools and Departments.
  • Help for highlighting the University's guidance for students.

From Pears and Shields (2023).

• Be aware:  If you don't already know, check with your tutor which referencing style you are expected to use.
• Be positive: used properly, references strengthen your writing, demonstrating that you have spent time researching and digesting material and produced your own opinions and arguments.
• Be decisive: about the best way to cite your sources and how you balance your use of direct quotations, paraphrasing and summarising (read about these in the introductory basic sections of Cite Them Right Online).
• Be organised: prepare well and keep a record of all potentially useful sources as you find them.
• Be prepared: read the suitable reference information before you begin your first assignment.
• Be consistent: once you have established the referencing style required, use it consistently throughout your pieces of work.
• Be patient: make time and take your time to ensure that your referencing is accurate.
• Be clear: clarify the type of source you are referencing and check Cite them Right Online for examples.
• Be thorough: check through your work and your references before you submit your assignment, ensuring that your citations all match with a full reference and vice versa.

References

Pears, R. and Shields, G. (2023) 'Top ten tips', in Cite Them Right Online. doi: 10.5040/9781350928060.11

• Bibliography - A list of all the sources you consulted for your work, including those you haven't cited, arranged in alphabetical order by author's surname or, when there is no author, by title. For web pages where no author or title is apparent, the URL of the web page would be useful.
• Citation - The in-text reference that gives brief details (for example author, date, page number) of the source you are quoting from or referring to. This citation corresponds with the full details of the work (title, publisher and so on) given in your reference list or bibliography, so that the reader can identify and/or locate the work. End-text citations are more commonly known as references.
• Common Knowledge - Facts that are generally known. For example, the fact that World War Two ended in 1945 is common knowledge and does not need to be referenced.
• Digital Object identifier (doi) - A numbered tag used to identify individual digital (online) sources, such as journal articles and conference papers.
• Direct quotation - The actual words used by an author, in exactly the same order as in their original work, and with the original spelling.
• Ellipsis - The omission of words from speech or writing. A set of three dots (...) shows where the original words have been omitted.
• End-text-citation - An entry in the reference list at the end of your work, which contains the full (bibliographical) details of information for the in-text citation.
• et al. - (From the Latin et alii meaning 'and others'.) A term most commonly used (for example Harvard author-date system) for works having more than three authors. For example, (Jones et al., 2014).
• Ibid - Ibid is the term used to provide an endnote or footnote. The previous reference should be immediately visible, for example, within the same paragraph or page. Please note that ibid is not used in Harvard referencing.
• In- text citation - Often know as simply the citation, this give brief details (for example author, date, page number) of your source of information within your text.
• Paraphrase - A restating of someone else's thoughts or ideas in your own words. You must always cite when paraphrasing.
• Peer-Review - A process used in academic publishing to check the accuracy and quality of a work intended for publication. The author's draft of a book or article is sent by an editor (usually anonymously) to experts in the subject, who suggest amendments or corrections. This process is seen as a guarantee of academic quality and is a major distinction between traditional forms of publishing, such as books and journals, and information in web pages, which can be written by anyone, even if they have no expertise in a subject.
• Plagiarism - Taking and using another person's thoughts, writings or inventions as your own without acknowledging or citing the source of the ideas and expressions. In the case of copyrighted material, plagiarism is illegal.
• Proper noun - The name of an individual person, place or organisation, having an initial capital letter.
• Quotation - The words or sentences from another information source used within your text.
• Reference - The full publication details of the work cited.
• Reference list - A list of references at the end of your assignment that includes the full information for your citations so that the reader can easily identify and retrieve each work (journal articles, books, web pages and so on).
• Secondary referencing - Citing/referencing a work that has been mentioned or quoted in the work you are reading. You may wish to refer to an author's idea, model or dataset but have not been able to read the actual chapter containing the information, but only another author's discussion or report of it. Similarly you may refer to a primary source, e.g. an author's letters or diary, or a government report, that you have only 'read' as cited or reproduced within an author's text. This is known as secondary referencing because you have not actually read the source, but only someone else's account of it.
• sic - (From the Latin meaning 'so, thus'.) A term used after a quoted or copied word to show that the original word has been written exactly as it appears in the original text, and usually highlights an error or misspelling of the word.
• Summarise - Similar to paraphrasing, summarising provides a brief account of someone else's ideas or work, covering only the main points and leaving out the details.
• URL - The abbreviation for Uniform (or Universal) Resource Locator, the address of documents and other information sources on the internet (for example http://...).
• Virtual learning environment (VLE) - An online teaching environment (also known as online learning environment- OLE) that allows interaction between tutors and students, and the storage of course documents and teaching materials.

References

Above text taken from:

Pears, R. and Shields, G. (2023) 'Glossary of referencing terms', in Cite Them Right Online. doi: 10.5040/9781350928060.21.