Cite Your Sources
If your syllabus does not specify, ask your professor what citation style you should be using for your papers.
Political Science scholars often use the Chicago Manual of Style (Chicago), American Psychological Association (APA), or American Political Science Association (APSA).
- Style Manual for Political Science
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Call Number: Ready Ref JA86 .A52 2006 and OnlineISBN: 1878147331Style manual from the American Political Science Association. A free PDF is available of the most recent edition from APSA website. The 2006 edition is available in the library. Availability and more information from Catalyst... 
Chicago Manual of Style (17th Edition) by Call Number: ONLINE and Ready Ref Z253 .U69 2017ISBN: 9780226287058Publication Date: 2017Availability and more information from Catalyst...
Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (APA) 7th Edition by Call Number: ONLINE and Ready Reference BF76.7 .P83 2020ISBN: 9781433832178Availability and more information from Catalyst...
Contains reference examples for citing: Textual Works, Data and Assessments, Audiovisual Media, and Online Media.
Keeping Track of Sources
For more advanced research projects (more than 5+ references), you may want to consider a bibliographic management tool. I'm happy to help you with these.
- Zotero
Save, organize, share, and cite your sources -- anything from scholarship to YouTube videos. Our guide has Carleton-specific instructions for installing and using Zotero with personal and lab computers, and for getting the most storage space possible. - EndNote
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Available to Carleton people, this is a fully featured bibliographic management system. Import citations from catalogs and databases or type them in by hand, embed PDFs, search, sort, export as a bibliography in any one of hundreds of citation styles, and manage long papers with Cite While You Write. - EndNote Online
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EndNote's online version has the great advantage of being accessible from anywhere that has an internet connection and of allowing you to share folders with collaborators.
NOTE: You'll need to create your own login and password. Be sure to use your Carleton email address. - MendeleyMendeley, owned by Elsevier, lets you save and annotate PDFs. You can also search across your own and others people's collections.
- Papers (Mac & IOS only)Search, annotate, organize, and share PDFs.
Data Citation
Citing data helps your readers locate data, replicate your findings, and generally promotes "open data" values. The following should be included in your citation:
- Author
- Publication Date
- Title
- Publisher or Distributor
- Version
- Electronic Location (e.g. URL)
Here is a Chicago Author-Date Style example:
The World Bank. 2012. World Development Indicators. Washington, D.C.: The World Bank (producer and distributor). http://data.worldbank.org/data-catalog/world-development-indicators
Here is Professor Montero's style:
The World Bank. 2012. "World Development Indicators." URL: http://data.worldbank.org/data-catalog/world-development-indicators
(Thanks to IASSIST Data Citation Guide.)
Helpful Guides to Chicago
- Chicago Style Citation Quick Guide
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Compiled and published by the Chicago Manual of Style. Choose Notes & Bib (humanities) or Author - Date (social science & science). Contains examples for how to cite: Book; Chapter or other part of an edited book; Translated book; E-book; Journal article; News or magazine article; Book review; Interview; Personal communication; Thesis or dissertation; Website content; Social media content. - Purdue OWL: Chicago Manual of Style GuideAn online guide to Chicago citation style (has most of the basics, but not everything that's in the full manual).
- Chicago Manual of Style Guide from UNC LibrariesHere is another helpful online guide to using Chicago.
Guides to Citing Data
- IASSIST Data Citation GuideFrom the International Association for Social Science Information Services and Technology (IASSIST), an association of data experts. Includes examples.
- Data Citation: What You Need to Know (ESRC)An in-depth guide from the Economic & Social Research Council. Includes examples.
- ICPSR: Data CitationsIncludes examples and general information about best practice.
Online Citation Generators
Use with caution. Like writing citations by hand, "garbage in, garbage out." Proof the final citations according to a style manual.
- KnightCiteThis is an online citation generator from Calvin College. Plug in your citation and this tool helps you create the proper formatting.
- Citation BuilderThis is an online citation generation from NCSU's library. Put in your citation and this tool helps you get it into the correct format.
