Chicago Reference Guide

The notes and bibliography system, Chicago’s oldest and most flexible, can accommodate a wide variety of sources, including unusual ones that don’t fit neatly into the author-date system. For this reason, it is preferred by many working in the humanities, including literature, history, and the arts.

In the notes and bibliography system, sources are cited in numbered footnotes or endnotes. Each note corresponds to a raised (superscript) number in the text. Citations in footnotes or endnotes within the text are supplemented by a bibliography at the end. 

The following format will be used:

• Full Note - use the first time that you cite a source.
• Subsequent Note - use after the first time you cite a source.
• Bibliography - use when you are compiling the Bibliography that appears at the end of your paper.

Block Quotations

• Use block quotations (also called extracts) if quoting: 

  • five or more lines of text and/or more than 100 words
  • two or more lines of poetry
  • two or more paragraphs
  • quoted correspondence (if including salutations and signatures)
• Formatting block quotations:
  • Single-spaced
  • Set off from the regular text by starting on a new line
  • Indent the entire block one-half inch on the left hand side (Use the indent/tab feature of your word processing software)
  • Do not enclose blocked quotation in quotation marks, but keep any quotation marks that appear in the original text
  • Leave a blank line before and after the block
  • Single-spaced  

Notes

• Notes may be listed at the bottom of the page on which the source is referenced (footnotes) OR at the end of the paper (endnotes). Please be consistent and choose to use either footnotes or endnotes, but not both
• Include a note (either endnote or footnote) every time that you use a source, whether through a direct quote or through a paraphrase or summary. 
• Footnote numbers are consecutive throughout the whole paper. If you re-use a source, it will get a new footnote number each time. 
• Begin the note with the author's first and last name; then list the title; and then give the publishing information and page numbers
• Titles of books and periodicals (i.e., journals) should be italicized; quotation marks should be used for chapters, essays, poems, or articles, and the publisher information should not be abbreviated
• Commas are used to separate the different "sections" or "elements". For both footnotes and endnotes, use a superscript number (small numbers raised to the top of the line) that corresponds to a note with the bibliographic information for that source should be placed in the text following the end of the sentence or clause in which the source is referenced. The foot/endnote itself begins with the appropriate full-sized number, followed by a period and then a space. Tip: Use the footnote feature of your word processing software to help format your notes.
• The first note referring to a work must use the full note style. Any following citations for that work can be shortened using the "subsequent note" format - shortened note which contains the author's last time, part of the source title, and whatever page number is relevant. 
• Format: single-spaced, with an empty line separating each footnote, and use a first line indent.

 Default Word footnotes (wrong for Chicago Style):

 Chicago-formatted footnotes:

Bibliography Page

• The bibliography page should be entitled "Bibliography"
• Start each bibliographic entry flush with the left margin, and indent all the other lines in the entry. This is called a "hanging indent" 
• Single spaced, but with an extra space between each bibliographic entry
• All entries should include the author, title, and publication information
• Titles of books and periodicals (i.e., journals) should be italicized, and quotation marks should be used for articles, chapters, and poems
• The publisher information should not be abbreviated
• Format the authors by inverting the first author listed and separate surname and first name with a comma (i.e., Surname, First name). Additional authors are listed in "First name Surname" format
• All major sections or "elements" are separated by a period
• ​List entries alphabetically by the surname of the first author or, if there is no author, by title
• If you use more than two entries by the same author(s) in the bibliography, list them alphabetically by title. 
• Up to six authors should be listed in a bibliography or reference list entry; if more than six, only the first three are listed, followed by “et al.” In a shortened note or an author-date text citation, up to two authors are now listed; if more than two, only the first is listed, followed by “et al.”
• Do not include the month or season when citing a journal.
• The page range for a cited chapter in an edited book is no longer required in a bibliography or reference list entry (though a page range is still required for most journal articles).
• A place of publication is no longer required in citations of books.
• Author-date reference list entries that include a month and day (as for a newspaper article) do not need to repeat the year with the month and day.
• Most of your paper will be double-spaced.
• Footnote entries & bibliography entries will be single-spaced. Footnotes will also use a "first line indent," making them look like a regular paragraph. Bibliography entries at the end of the paper will use a hanging indent like you've probably used in MLA and APA.