In APA style, you should include the following elements in all in-text citations:

• the author’s last name(s)
• the year
• and if you are quoting, also the page number or other locator

Placing citations appropriately distinguishes your ideas from those of others. In all three citation styles (APA, MLA, Chicago), you can place citations in two places:

• Directly after the information from the source
• Within the sentence itself

Directly After the Information

EXAMPLE

• There is also the argument that ….   (Mitchell, 1996).

APA includes the author and date information in parentheses.

Within the sentence itself

EXAMPLE

• Mitchell (1996) argues…

Author then date, in parentheses immediately after.

Have a look at the following paragraphs. The first two citations follow the information from the source, while the third citation includes the author information in an introductory phrase.

Although Canada’s multicultural policy is liberal and democratic in its goals, there are reasons to be sceptical about its value. Detractors argue that the state should not enshrine differences into policy, but should rather aim to treat everyone the same, or more accurately, provide the conditions such that all members of society can have access to equal opportunities (Barry, 2001). One could even argue that a multicultural policy magnifies cultural differences instead of promoting a homogenous diversity. The policy has also been attacked for promoting the interests of the English-Canadian majority (Day & Sadick, 2002). Mitchell (1996) goes even further with this, arguing that it is a policy designed to further the capitalist interests of the “elites”.

Attribution

This chapter is an adaptation of 5.1 In-Text Citations by Donnie Calabrese; Emma Russell; Jasmine Hoover; and Tammy Byrne and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted. You can download this book free at Academic Integrity Handbook Copyright © 2020.