If you’re working on a research paper, or any paper that draws on multiple sources, you’ll want to include footnotes or endnotes. You don’t need to use notes if you’re referencing only, for example, the edition of Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing that everyone in class is using. In that case, you can refer to acts, scenes, and lines within the text of the paper. (For more on in-paper references, see Citations in Text.)

Be sure to footnote not only quoted material but also summaries of other writers’ arguments. You do not need to footnote basic facts known to most experts, even if you discovered them in the work of one particular expert; you do need to footnote theories and points that are unique or uniquely expressed.

List the author’s name, the title of the article (in quotation marks), the name of the periodical in which the article appeared (in italics), the volume number of the periodical, the date on which the article appeared, and the pages in which the article appeared.

On the second mention and thereafter, list the author’s last name, the title of the article (abbreviated if long), and the page number.

If you want to write your own commentary in a footnote, include it after the source information.

Footnotes need not always cite a source. Occasionally they can be used for your own commentary.

List the author’s name first, followed by the title (in italics), the name(s) of the editor(s) and/or translator(s), the location of the publishing company, the publishing company, the year of publication, and the page number.

On the second mention and thereafter, include the last names only, the title, and the page number(s). Do not include the abbreviations ed. or trans.

If you footnote a source and your next footnote comes from the exact same source, there is no need to repeat all of the information. Instead, use the abbreviation ibid., which is short for ibidem (“in the same place”). This will tell your readers that you’re referencing the exact same source that you referenced in the previous footnote. If the page reference is the same as in the previous footnote, use ibid. by itself. If the page reference is different, include it.

In Microsoft Word, insert footnotes or endnotes by clicking on Insert and scrolling down to Reference, then Footnote.

Note that in all footnotes, long titles (The Brooklyn Cyclones: A Tale of Minor League Magic) should be written out in full (in italics) in the first note. In subsequent notes, shorten the title and omit the article if it comes at the beginning of the title (Brooklyn Cyclones).

The first time you footnote a work, list the author’s name (first name first), the title (in italics), the location of the publishing company, the publishing company, the year of publication, and the page number(s).

There is no need to footnote works in full after the first time they are mentioned. After citing a book once, simply footnote the author’s last name, the title (in italics), and the page number.

List the authors in the order in which they’re listed on the title page (first names first), the title (in italics), the location of the publishing company, the publishing company, the year of publication, and the page number(s).

On the second mention and thereafter, include the authors’ last names only, the title (in italics), and the page number(s).

In a book with chapters, the footnotes should not be numbered continuously throughout the book. Instead, the footnotes in each chapter should begin with the number 1.

Place the footnote number at the end of the sentence rather than directly after the quotation. Be sure to use superscript (text above the normal text), not normal numerals. In Microsoft Word, this can be accomplished simply by clicking Insert and choosing Reference, then Footnote.

If a paper or book contains only a few quotations, you can indicate footnotes with ^* or ^† or other symbols instead of numbering the footnotes. If you choose this option, use the symbols in this order: * † ‡ §