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Citation Guide: Chicago Style Guide

Guide to the MLA Citation Style, 9th Edition

Guides for Chicago Manual of Style

Chicago Manual of Style Online (https://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citationguide.html)

Purdue OWL (https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/chicago_manual_17th_edition/cmos_formatting_and_style_guide/chicago_manual_of_style_17th_edition.html)

A manual for writers of research papers, theses, and dissertations: Chicago Style for students and researchers (LB2369 .T8 2007)

Citing Sources from Archival Collections using CMOS

Citation of materials in archival collections requires the researcher to provide enough information to allow someone else to find that material if they want to. Specific information to include in your citation includes:

  • Author of the document
  • A title that identifies the document
    • Look for a title on the document itself. If there is none, devise one that meaningfully describes the item. (e.g. Letter to Priscilla Brown; meeting minutes).
  • The date the item was created. This could be an actual day, month, year, or approximate date based on context.
  • Container information (such as box and folder) where you found the item.
  • Title of the collection in which the document was found.
  • Collection number or other unique identifier for the collection. May start with a prefix, such as “MS” or “MSS”.
  • Name of the repository, or archive.
  • Name of the parent institution or geographic location.

Examples of footnotes, using primary sources:

  • Manuscripts
    • Brown, Priscilla. “Letter from Byron Libby to Priscilla Brown.” January 7, 1859. William and Priscilla Brown Letters, 1830-1876 (MSS-256), Box 1, Folder 7, Ward M. Canaday Center for Special Collections, University of Toledo.
  • Film
    • Keighley, William, director. Target Tokyo. 8 mm film. United States: First Motion Picture Unit, 1944. World War II Short Films Collection, 1941-1947 (MSS-303), Box 1, Ward M. Canaday Center for Special Collections, University of Toledo.
  • Photograph
    • Duhaime, Donald D. “Two soldiers posing on Attu Island.” Photograph, 1943. Donald D. Duhaime Alaska Photograph Collection, 1887-1944 (MSS-019), Box 1, Item 25, Ward M. Canaday Center for Special Collections, University of Toledo.

Chicago Manual of Style (CMOS)

What to know about CMOS:

  • Focuses on two methods: Notes-Bibliography (NB) and Author-Date (AD).
  • The Notes-Bibliography method of documentation is used by those in the arts, literature, and history. We will focus on the NB method in this guide.
  • NB uses numbered footnotes, as opposed to in-text citations. Examples of footnotes with primary sources can be found below.

Basic Rules of Chicago Manual of Style (CMOS)

  • Text should be consistently double-spaced, except for block quotations, notes, bibliography entries, table titles, and figure captions.
  • For block quotations, which are also called extracts:
    • A prose quotation of five or more lines, or more than 100 words, should be blocked.
    • CMOS recommends blocking two or more lines of poetry.
    • A blocked quotation does not get enclosed in quotation marks.
    • A blocked quotation must always begin a new line.
    • Blocked quotations should be indented with the word processor’s indention tool.
  • Page numbers begin in the header of the first page of text with Arabic number 1.