⌨️Referencing in text

Source materials need to be referenced at the point where they are introduced. In linguistics, this takes the form of in-text parenthetic references. (Other disciplines, such as literature, use footnotes for references.) Parenthetic in-text referencing is straightforward: you include the author and year of the source in parenthesis near where it is referenced, as illustrated in (7):

(7) In the earliest proposals for variable rules, Labov and others clearly conceived of them as a refinement of the optional rules in contemporary generative theory (Labov 1972: 93-95; Wolfram and Fasold 1974: 99-100). Cedergren and Sankoff argue, ‘[t]he full importance of variable rules can be appreciated only from a certain paradigmatic viewpoint, one which constitutes a slight but distinct shift from generative theory’ (1974: 352).

Content, format & placement

In-text references must contain the following key information:

• last name of author(s);

• year of publication

• Where appropriate, page number(s) (see Use of page numbers)

If the author’s name is part of the prose, only the year of publication (and page numbers) are included in parentheses, as shown in (8). If the author’s name is not part of the prose, their name is also included in parentheses, as shown in (9).

(8) Bybee (2003) argues that frequency is both a contributor to and result of grammaticalization.

(9) Frequency is both a contributor to and result of grammaticalization (Bybee 2003).

Multiple Authors

If the referenced work was written by two authors, both authors are named, as shown in (10).

(10) a. Sandler and Lillo-Martin (2001: 533) posit that ‘[s]ign language research has [...] made a significant contribution to our understanding of human language’. b. ‘Sign language research has [...] made a significant contribution to our understanding of human language’ (Sandler and Lillo-Martin 2001: 533).

If the referenced work was written by three or more authors, only the first author’s name is specified, followed by et al. (which means ‘and others’) in italics, as shown in (11).

(11) a. Sproat et al. (2001) provide a critical overview of the field of computational linguistics. b. Parsing is one of the main areas of inquiry in computational linguistics (see, for example, Sproat et al. 2001: 608-615 for a comprehensive overview).

Page Numbers

When referring to somebody else’s work, page numbers are not provided when reference is made to a theory, argument, or result that spans across a whole article, chapter or book. However, page numbers must be provided with the in-text reference when:

• Quoting directly (verbatim) from the work

• Paraphrasing a specific passage or argument in the work

• Referring to specific statistics, figures, and tables in the work