Books are intellectual property. If you are writing a theme, an article or a document of any kind and you find yourself citing a book, you must give the author due recognition. Not doing this is considered plagiarism. The various ways to cite a book are listed below - they are all appropriate and acceptable, but if you are writing an academic paper, ask your teacher if you should adhere to a particular citation style.
Steps
Method 1 of 4: Check out the most common citation styles
Step 1. Familiarize yourself with accepted citation styles
Use only one style when citing a book - each style has its own rules regarding capitalization, punctuation and the order in which to place the cited elements. However, all styles were created for the same purpose: to give due recognition to those who deserve it. The most common styles are listed below:
- "Modern Language Association" (MLA) style. This is the quotation style used most often in university faculties of liberal arts and humanities.
- "American Psychological Association" (APA) style. This citation style is often used in social science faculties.
- "Chicago Manual" style. This citation style is often used to write documents in the fields of literature, history and art. However, many students also use APA or MLA.
Method 2 of 4: Quote a Book Using the APA Style
Step 1. Cite the source book both within the text and in the bibliography
The APA (American Psychological Association) requires the citation to be present in both places. For example, if you have to cite the book "The Epic of America", you must cite it within the text with the title (in italics) and the year of publication: The Epic of America, (1931). You will then have to cite it adequately also in the bibliography following the specific rules relating to the citation of authors, publishers and books:
- Citing of books: Author, A. A. (Year of publication). Title of the work (in italics and with the first letter of the title and the first letter of the subtitle in capital letters). Place of publication: Publishing house. For example: Susanka, S. (2007). The not so big life: Making room for what really matters. New York, NY: Random House.
- Cite unauthored published book: Brown, C., & Smith, A. (Publishers). (2010). How to make widgets. Boston, MA: ABC Publishing.
- To cite a book with author and editor: Gray, R. (2010). The path to glory. A. Anderson (Ed.). Boston, MA: ABC Publishing.
- To quote a translated book: Pierre, P. S. (1904). A journey through the mind. (T. Garvey, Trans.). New York, NY: ABC Publishing.
- To quote a book that is not a first edition: Aiken, M. E., (1997). The gold standard (7th ed.). Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
- Cite an article or chapter published within a book: Lander, J. M., & Goss, M. (2010). How the west was settled. In T. Grayson (Ed.), The rockies and beyond (pp. 107-123). New York, NY: Simon & Schuster.
- To quote a work published in several volumes: Paulson, P. (Ed.). (1964). Dictionary of inventions (Vol. 1-6). New York, NY: Scribner's.
Method 3 of 4: Quote a Book Using the MLA Style
Step 1. To cite a book using the MLA style, cite it both in the text and on the Cited Works page
The quotation in the text is parenthetical, which means it must be enclosed in parentheses and placed after the quote or after you have paraphrased something written in a book.
Step 2. Always mention the author (and / or publisher), the title of the book, the date of publication, the publisher, the place of publication and the medium (book, web, DVD, etc.)
).
Step 3. Write the citations on the "Cited Works" page, so that they exactly match the citations within the text
The quotes or phrases you use in the text should appear first, in the left margin of the page, in correspondence with the information about the work.
Step 4. Cite the book using the author-page style
The MLA format follows the author-page method for citing within the text. In the text there must be only the name of the author of the book and the page number (or numbers) relating to the passage cited, but the citation must then be completed in the "Works Cited" page.
- Kingsolver stated that his prose was considered by many to be "at times, pedantic" (Kingsolver 125). This informs the reader that the claim made by the author called Kingsolver can be found on p. 125. Your readers can find the name of the book and other relevant information on the "Works Cited" page, which will refer to the book like this:
- Kingsolver, Ronald. Give Me a Moment. New York: Random House, 1932. Print.
Step 5. Use appropriate citations for multiple editions
Again, the page number is required, but it is important to provide detailed information on the edition of the book, as the reader needs to know which edition to refer to. (This rule often applies to classical and literary works).
- The corresponding citation on the "Works Cited" page (for a work that has two or more editions) must include the page number of the edition you cited followed by a semicolon, and the volume, chapter, section or the paragraph. Use proper abbreviations without capital letters:
- Volume (vol.)
- Chapter (chap.)
- Section (sect.)
- Paragraph (par.)
Step 6. Cite all authors
If it's a book that has more than one author, you need to include all of their names:
Berger, Mitry, and Neilson state that tougher gun control laws need to be passed (176). The authors state: "Tighter gun control in the United States in no way violates the Second Amendment rights to bear arms" (Berger, Mitry, & Neilson 176)
Step 7. Mention all books cited by a single author
If you use citations taken from 2 or more books by the same author, you must name them all both in the text and in the "Works Cited" page:
Lipton states that daily writing practice is "critical to a writer's success" (Practice, Preactice, Practice! 5). However, Lipton also states that "one must sometimes walk away and do anything but write for a week at a time" (A Writer's Advice 7). These quotes communicate to the reader that you have referred to 2 different books by the same author
Step 8. Cite works published in multiple volumes
If you quote from several volumes of a multivolume work, you must include the volume number. That number is followed by a colon, a space, and the page (s) number:
… As Tangener wrote in A History of the Universe (1: 87-101). This tells the reader that the quote can be found in volume 1 between pages 87 and 101
Method 4 of 4: Quoting an Electronic Book
Step 1. Do not omit to mention an electronic book (ebook)
In general, the citation should include the same elements as the citation for a printed book: author, date and title. Often, however, ebooks do not have numbered pages, so you can not put the page number in the quote. Also, among the basic information you should include the source (URL or DOI):
Anderson, R. (2010). The Love of Money [Kindle]. Downloaded from https://www.xxxx. This type of quote is still subjected to numerous revisions by style guides
Advice
- Let your common sense guide you. It is not necessary to document the sources of proverbs or family quotes that have been heard for years and that are considered to be in the public domain. In other words, don't waste time looking for the original source of "Whoever does it himself does for three."
- If the place of publication of the book is in the United States, you should include the state postal abbreviation. For example, write California as CA and Florida as FL.
- Always use "pp" for the page number, don't write "page xx."
Note: For "Place," you should always quote the city and state using the post abbreviation without a period (New York, NY).
If your style guide requires you to use only the surname of an author, but you have two authors with the same surname, you can add the initial of each
Warnings
- Always refer to the latest edition of a style guide. Graduate students should also refer to the MLA Style Manual and the School Publications Guide.
- Style guides can be found in many public libraries.
- Don't confuse the AP style with the APA style. AP refers to "Associated Press" and is the writing style used by journalists.
