Many students are unfamiliar with the conventions used to put in references in their essays. We know that it can confusing so here are some places you can look for help.

Try the online tutorial on referencing available under the Student resources tab at the top of ELE (the section on Undergraduate skills ).

The Library’s subject librarians can help you too. Have a look at the subject pages on the home page – each subject has a section on Information skills with details of all the main systems. Don’t forget that each College or discipline has its own preferred form of referencing so make sure you know which it is. You can find out more from your College handbook.

Although the rules look complicated to start with you can use computer programs and databases to help make life easier. When you find articles on our databases you will usually find all the information you need for your references and many of them provide ready-made citations.

It is a good idea to keep track of your references as you go along to save problems later. Try using referencing software to help you. One of the most popular services is EndNote, which is available on all the PC clusters, and EndNote Web, a free web version which you can sign up to online. The subject pages include details of EndNote and EndNote Web as well as some of the free sites, like Mendeley and Zotero if you want to try them out.