Chicago Manual (parenthetical)

The Chicago Manual of Style includes an author + date + page number system for parenthetical in-text citations, which is a more formal referencing system. This consists of parenthetical citations within the text of the form (Author Year) or (Author Year, page #), with a bibliography (end references, works cited) at the end with full information on the sources cited. The author-date system is used in many humanities fields (e.g., history, philosophy, international studies), and sometimes in sciences and social sciences. This formal author-date-page system is illustrated below.

There also exists a more semi-formal notes and bibliography style, consisting of footnotes and a works cited section. This is used in humanities publications (e.g., less formal or less academic publications in literature, history, arts). The CM system, including the notes + bibliography style, can handle some more unusual source types that do not fit well in an author-date system such as the APA. For more details on the CM author-date or note-bibliography systems, refer to the CM website (http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org). In academic writing in history studies, the Turabian style may be used, which is very similar to CM. but there is also a footnote / endnote plus bibliography format.

• See also: Full guide to Chicago Manual notes+bibliography and parenthetical styles

1 Overview

The CM website lists the end reference format followed by an example of the corresponding in-text citation, and this format is used for the examples below. The examples below are from http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citationguide.html.

Works Cited	Pollan, Michael. 2006. The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals. New York: Penguin.
In-text citation	(Pollan 2006, 99–100)

2 Books

One author

Pollan, Michael. 2006. The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals. New York: Penguin.

(Pollan 2006, 99–100)

Two or more authors

Ward, Geoffrey C., and Ken Burns. 2007. The War: An Intimate History, 1941–1945. New York: Knopf.

(Ward and Burns 2007, 52)

Four or more authors

For the in-text citation, list the first author followed by ‘et al.’, and list all the authors in the end reference.

(Barnes et al. 2010)

Editors or other non-authors (translators, compilers, etc.)

Lattimore, Richmond, trans. 1951. The Iliad of Homer. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

(Lattimore 1951, 91–92)

Author plus editor or translator

García Márquez, Gabriel. 1988. Love in the Time of Cholera. Translated by Edith Grossman. London: Cape.

(García Márquez 1988, 242–55)

Edited volume

Kelly, John D. 2010. “Seeing Red: Mao Fetishism, Pax Americana, and the Moral Economy of War.” In Anthropology and Global Counterinsurgency, edited by John D. Kelly, Beatrice Jauregui, Sean T. Mitchell, and Jeremy Walton, 67–83. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. (Kelly 2010, 77)

Republished source or secondary citation

Cicero, Quintus Tullius. 1986. “Handbook on Canvassing for the Consulship.” In Rome: Late Republic and Principate, edited by Walter Emil Kaegi Jr. and Peter White. Vol. 2 of University of Chicago Readings in Western Civilization, edited by John Boyer and Julius Kirshner, 33–46. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Originally published in Evelyn S. Shuckburgh, trans., The Letters of Cicero, vol. 1 (London: George Bell & Sons, 1908).

(Cicero 1986, 35)

Preface, foreword, introduction, or similar part of a book

Rieger, James. 1982. Introduction to Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, xi–xxxvii. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

(Rieger 1982, xx–xxi)

Book published electronically

If you use the electronic version of a book, cite it with a URL (an access date is given only if one is required by your publisher or discipline). If page numbers are unavailable, a section title, chapter, or other identifier can be given.

Austen, Jane. 2007. Pride and Prejudice. New York: Penguin Classics. Kindle edition.

(Austen 2007)

Kurland, Philip B., and Ralph Lerner, eds. 1987. The Founders’ Constitution. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/.

(Kurland and Lerner, chap. 10, doc. 19)

3 Journal articles

Article in a print journal

The in-text citation includes the publication year and the specific page numbers that you consulted, if any. The end reference should list the page range for the entire article.

Weinstein, Joshua I. 2009. “The Market in Plato’s Republic.” Classical Philology 104:439–58.

(Weinstein 2009, 440)

Article in an online journal

Include a DOI (Digital Object Identifier) if the journal lists one. A DOI is a permanent ID that, when appended to http://dx.doi.org/ in the address bar of an Internet browser, will lead to the source. If no DOI is available, list a URL. Include an access date only if one is required by your publisher or discipline.

Kossinets, Gueorgi, and Duncan J. Watts. 2009. “Origins of Homophily in an Evolving Social Network.” American Journal of Sociology 115:405–50. Accessed February 28, 2010. doi:10.1086/599247.

(Kossinets and Watts 2009, 411)

4 Popular periodical or newspaper articles

Newspaper and magazine articles may be cited in running text (“As Sheryl Stolberg and Robert Pear noted in a New York Times article on February 27, 2010, . . .”), and they are commonly omitted from a reference list. The following examples show the more formal versions of the citations. If you consulted the article online, include a URL; include an access date only if your publisher or discipline requires one. If no author is identified, begin the citation with the article title.

Mendelsohn, Daniel. 2010. “But Enough about Me.” New Yorker, January 25.

(Mendelsohn 2010, 68)

Stolberg, Sheryl Gay, and Robert Pear. 2010. “Wary Centrists Posing Challenge in Health Care Vote.” New York Times, February 27. Accessed February 28, 2010. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/28/us/politics/28health.html.

(Stolberg and Pear 2010)

5 Other print sources

Book review

Kamp, David. 2006. “Deconstructing Dinner.” Review of The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals, by Michael Pollan. New York Times, April 23, Sunday Book Review. http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/23/books/review/23kamp.html. (Kamp 2006)

Thesis or dissertation

Choi, Mihwa. 2008. “Contesting Imaginaires in Death Rituals during the Northern Song Dynasty.” PhD diss., University of Chicago.

(Choi 2008)

Item in a commercial database

For items retrieved from a commercial database, add the name of the database and an accession number following the facts of publication. In this example, the dissertation cited above is shown as it would be cited if it were retrieved from ProQuest’s database for dissertations and theses.

Choi, Mihwa. 2008. “Contesting Imaginaires in Death Rituals during the Northern Song Dynasty.” PhD diss., University of Chicago. ProQuest (AAT 3300426).

Paper presented at a meeting or conference

Adelman, Rachel. 2009. “‘Such Stuff as Dreams Are Made On’: God’s Footstool in the Aramaic Targumim and Midrashic Tradition.” Paper presented at the annual meeting for the Society of Biblical Literature, New Orleans, Louisiana, November 21–24.

(Adelman 2009)

6 Electronic sources

Website

A citation to website content can often be limited to a mention in the text (“As of July 19, 2008, the McDonald’s Corporation listed on its website . . .”). If a more formal citation is desired, it may be styled as in the examples below. Because such content is subject to change, include an access date or, if available, a date that the site was last modified. In the absence of a date of publication, use the access date or last-modified date as the basis of the citation.

Google. 2009. “Google Privacy Policy.” Last modified March 11, 2020. http://www.google.com/intl/en/privacypolicy.html.

(Google 2009)

McDonald’s Corporation. 2008. “McDonald’s Happy Meal Toy Safety Facts.” Accessed July 19, 2020. http://www.mcdonalds.com/corp/about/factsheets.html.

(McDonald’s 2008)

Blog entry or web comment

Blog entries or comments may be cited in running text (“In a comment posted to The Becker-Posner Blog on February 23, 2010, . . .”), and they are commonly omitted from a reference list. If a reference list entry is needed, cite the blog post there but mention comments in the text only. (If an access date is required, add it before the URL; see examples elsewhere in this guide.)

Posner, Richard. 2010. “Double Exports in Five Years?” The Becker-Posner Blog, February 21. http://uchicagolaw.typepad.com/beckerposner/2010/02/double-exports-in-five-years-posner.html.

(Posner 2010)

E-mail or text message

E-mail and text messages may be cited in running text (“In a text message to the author on March 1, 2010, John Doe revealed . . .”), and they are rarely listed in a reference list. In parenthetical citations, the term personal communication (or pers. comm.) can be used.

(John Doe, e-mail message to author, February 28, 2010)

Or

(John Doe, pers. comm.)

7 See also

1. Chicago Manual, official website
2. Chicago Manual, complete guide

7.1 Other pages on referencing / citation systems:

  Academic versus non-academic sources

  APA (overview)

  APA guide

  Chicago Manual

  Chicago Manual (parenthetical)

  Citation systems

  Harvard style

  IEEE style

  MLA guide

  Popular sources

  Professional sources

  Reporting verbs

  Reporting verbs (introduction)

  Unreliable sources

  Writing literature reviews