In-text citation

A short pointer in your sentence to the full entry for a source in your reference list.

An in-text citation tells your reader which source an idea or quote came from, so they can find it in your reference list.

There are two forms:

• Parenthetical: the citation goes in parentheses, often at the end of the sentence: (Luna, 2020).
• Narrative: the author is part of your sentence: Luna (2020) found that…

What goes inside depends on the style: APA uses author and year, MLA uses author and page, and Chicago author-date uses author, year and page with no comma before the year. Chicago’s notes system and IEEE use numbers instead. Every in-text citation must match an entry in your list.