Chicago Manual of Style Citation Guide

In the author-date system, sources are cited within parentheses in the text itself. The publication details of the sources used are detailed in the reference list. This list is formatted slightly differently from the bibliography, its equivalent in the notes and bibliography system.

Please note, when citing sources consulted online,  the uniform resource locator, or URL, should generally be included as the final element in a citation. Further information can be found here.

As many e-books and other electronic formats feature scrolling text it may not be possible to cite specific page numbers. For advice on other options go here.

In-text citation:

Generally, an in-text citation consists of at least two elements, the author's last name and the date of publication. These are  placed in parenthesis at the appropriate point in the text.  A third element needs be included when a specific page, range of pages, paragraph, or other division of a work is being cited. That information should follow the date of publication, being separated from it by a comma. 

    (Richardson  2020, 75)

If the author's name appears in the text, it is not necessary to repeat it in the citation.

   '...as Richardson  says (2020, 75)....'

Reference list entry:

The author's name should be inverted  (last name first) and the date of publication placed between it and the book's title.

  Richardson, Allissa, V. 2020.  Bearing Witness while Black : African Americans, Smartphones, and the New Protest #journalism. New York: Oxford University Press.

In-text citation:

For works with two or three authors, include all their names.

   (Walcott and Abdillahi 2019, 25)

For works with more than three authors, give only the name of the first author followed by 'et al'.

   (McGarry et al. 2020) or '...according to the argument made by McGarry  et al. (2020)....'

Reference-list entry:

For works with two or three authors, list all the authors inverting the name of the first.

  Walcott, Rinaldo and Idil Abdillahi. 2019.  BlackLife: Post-BLM and the Struggle for Freedom. Winnipeg: ARP Books, 2019.

For works with more than three authors, include all their names following the word-order and punctuation model for works with two or three authors.

In-text citation: Do NOT include "ed." in the text citation.

(Smith 2022, 45)

Reference list entry: DO include it in the reference list.

Smith, John, ed. 2022. Children of the Rainbow. Gabriola Island: New Society Publishers.

In-text citation:

For edited collections, where the chapters are written by different hands, give the chapter author, date of publication, and (where appropriate) the relevant  page number or other locator:

   (Arauz 2020, 238)

Reference list entry:

Begin with  the name of the chapter author (last name first), followed by the date of publication, chapter title (in quotation marks), title of the book (preceded by the word "In"), editor's name, place of publication and publisher's name.

Arauz, Silvia Argentina. 2020. "Mothering in the Movement." In Until we are Free : reflections on Black Lives Matter in Canada, edited by Rodney Diverlus, Sandy Hudson and Syrus Marcus Ware, 237-45. Regina: University of Regina Press.