How to Write a College Level Bibliography

A bibliography is needed for college level papers.

A bibliography is a necessary section for most college research papers. Basically, a bibliography is a list of all the sources used to write the paper or essay. These sources are listed in a certain format and placed at the end of the paper. You may refer to come of the sources throughout your paper and your professor may have a specific format for your bibliography, but there is a standard form to use.

Instructions

1. Double space your bibliography and indent approximately a half-inch each line after the first line of each source.

2. List all of the authors for each of your sources. Alphabetize the authors by last name.

3. Type the last name, a comma and the first name. For works with multiple authors, type the first author's last name first and the rest of the authors in standard format. Place commas between each author, and type a period at the end. For example, type "Smith, John, Steve Jones, Ted Parker."

4. Type the name of the book underlined or the name of the article in quotation marks, followed by a period.

5. Add the city where the book was published, a colon, the publishing company, a comma, the year the book was published and a period. For example, type "New York: Random House, 2005." For an article found in a magazine or newspaper, add the name of the publication underlined, the date, a colon, the page numbers and a period, in this format: "Los Angeles Times, 15 May 2008: B12." For academic journals, the name of the publication is followed by the volume number, a period, the issue number, the year the work was published in parentheses, a colon, the page numbers and a period. For example, type "Business Journal 12.3 (2008): 45-62."

6. Add the date you accessed the article online if it was found on the Internet. Then add the URL for the source in brackets, followed by a period. For example, type "4 April 2009 <http://www.source.com>."

References

• A Research Guide for Students: How to Write a Bibliography

Resources

• EasyBib: Automatic Bibliography and Citation Maker