Citation is the way of acknowledging the sources from which you have taken any information in your writing. So, what you are doing is that to tell the reader that from where did this information come. Referencing can simply be defined as the detailing of that source. Referencing enables the reader to know about the type of source used for extracting the information. Citation and referencing are known as apples and oranges of the writing world.
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When to do citation and referencing?
The first thing that you need to know is that when you need to give credits to a source for using their information. So whenever you directly quote, rephrase, or summarize someone else’s idea either from an article, newspaper, book, or anywhere else in your writing, it should be followed by an in-text citation. For a quotation also remember adding double quotation marks at both ends of the quotation.
How to cite and refer?
Different styles are followed for citation. The most common one is APA in-text citation style. According to this style, use only the author’s last name and year of publication like (Heart, 1980). If you are citing a direct quote you have to add the page number as well, for example: (Heart, 1980, p.122). For every in-text citation, there must be a corresponding reference in the reference list.
Importance of citation and referencing
So, the point to ponder here is that why do we need to do all this grind. You must be thinking that why don’t we simply use whatever information we extracted from different sources? Why does acknowledgment possess any significance? Well here is a detailed answer to all of these questions. Underlying are the main reasons which make citation and references a must.
- Avoiding plagiarism
Think of an essay that you have written after spending hours researching and writing. If somebody uses any of the information from that article without asking for permission, will you approve it or consider it as stealing of your intellectual property? Doesn’t matter that from wherever you got the information. It can be from books, articles, magazines, YouTube, or from somewhere else. But in any case, it is someone else work and this is the most significant point here. You can’t steal someone else’s property.
This stealing is commonly known as plagiarism and can result in a copyright claim. Plagiarism can also be understood as showing someone else’s work as yours. It is quite obvious that if someone is using your work you deserve credit for it. So, by giving credit to the owner of the information you avoid plagiarism in your work. You may know that colleges and universities have a very strict policy on plagiarism so submitting a plagiarised essay will be of no use.
- Enhance the credibility of your work
By citing the sources your teacher gets to know that you have researched the topic. Showing that your ideas are backed up by the experts your argument becomes stronger. So, your essay becomes more credible and more persuasive. Your arguments possess more weight due to the citation. So your essay makes a much better impression straight away.
- Making sources accessible
Another reason to cite is to allow the reader access to the sources. Because a reader might want to explore more about the topic by looking at one of the sources, so by doing citation and referencing you allow the readers reach to a more in-depth knowledge of the topic.
- Fact-checking
While writing an essay you have to rely on facts. How does the reader know that your facts are accurate?
To convince the reader of your view you need to demonstrate that the facts were taken from a dependable source. So referencing enables the reader to check the authenticity of the mentioned facts. In other words, we can say that you provide evidence of your claim by adding references.
- More Persuasive Essay
Logics and arguments are of great significance but they can be disregarded by some other logic. But facts are always the key as they are in-variable. So when the reader is going through your essay he/she must come across enough facts to be convinced of your view. But the authenticity of these facts will again be dependent on their source. So all in all adding references to your essay will help you persuade the reader.
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