Harvard is a referencing style that it primary users, the university students use for citing sources. It is a parenthetical author-date reference system with its origin at Harvard University where a zoology professor in the institution first used parenthetical references in the 1880s.
Parenthetical referencing is a system where the writer encloses partial citations within parentheses in text within or after the sentence. E.g ” (Mark 2017, p.10) “. At the end of a section is a full list of citations in alphabetized order under the title “references, works cited reference list or end-text citations.”
Harvard referencing uses author-date format identifies the authors or sources in-text and lists all citations from sources at the end of an academic assignment. The use of the author-date system is the reason why Harvard closely relates to APA. The other method is author-title or author-page format like in MLA.
Harvard’s origin is in biology, but it is now in wide use for humanities, social science, and history. Some scientific journals favor the style.
In-text citation: You use this citation when quoting a source directly or paraphrasing. The location of in-text citation is in the body of the text. Depending on the source, the citation will be in a format similar to this one: “I was at Harvard for the first time…” (Mark, 2017).
Reference lists: Displays full citation of the sources a writer uses in the assignment at the end of the work. For example, a full citation for a book in Harvard Reference list is Mark M. (2016). The Great Wall. Washington: Scribner.
In-text citation method in Harvard cites all the statements, opinions, conclusions and other content that you directly take from another author. It can be through paraphrasing, direct quoting or summarizing. You use author-date method by proving the surname of the author and year of publication for the work. If it is necessary to provide details of certain parts of the document such as page numbers, you should give them after the year but within the parentheses.
You cite in one of these citation forms:
- When the author’s name in occurring naturally in a sentence, you should give the year in the parentheses. E.g. In his Harvard study, Mark (2017, P.55) argues that…
- If the name is not occurring naturally in a sentence, you will give the name and year in the parentheses. E.g. More recent studies (Mark 2016; Jean 2017) show that …
- When you cite more than one document with the same year of publication, you differentiate them by adding lowercase letters after the year but within a parenthesis. E.g. Mark (2017a) discusses the challenges…
- For work by two authors give the surnames of both. E.g. Mark and Jean (2017) propose that
- Cite work by three or more authors by providing only the surname of the first and follow it by et al. to represent the rest. E.g. Mark et al. (2017) conclude that …
- Uses “Anon” when there is the originator. E.g. A recent article (Anon 2017) states that…
- If you refer to specific point within an article or book, you should mention the page number(s). E.g. Mark (2017 p. 26) provides guidelines writing an essay n Harvard citation method. You may avoid using page numbers when referring to the overall argument in a book or article. E.g. Mark (2017) presents different variables on the matter.
- You may include a short quotation of less than one line in the body of the text in quotation marks. E.g. … hence ” practicing in this citation method requires teaching”(Mark 2017, P.10) and we professors should… A longer line requires that you begin a new line and indent. Include the page number is mandatory.
- Reference diagrams the same way as a quotation. Give the author and date alongside then provide full details on references list.
- Referencing a journal article: Indicate Author name and date. Use paragraph number or section if a journal does not have a page number e.g. (Mark 2017, sec .2.Par.2)
- E-Books and PDFs: Cite in-text as like a printed book. e.g. Lloyd (2005, p. 262) or (Lloyd 2005, p. 262).
- News publications and magazines: Cite news articles from any electronic database thus: Author-year (Mark 2017)
- News article without author: Cite name of the publication (New York Times 2017) Or discuss in the body or a paragraph e.g. The popularity of Harvard referencing in the USA in New York Times (2017)
- Broadcast materials: Broadcast materials include video, CD, films and television content. Provide full title and production date e.g My Referencing Lessons, 2017
- Emails and electronic communication: Cite the sender beginning with initial, name, year, personal communication, date and month. E.g. M.Mark 2017, pers.comm. 10 October. Mention the form of communication in text only when necessary. E.g. Email instruction received (M.Mark 2017, pers. Comm. 10 October)
Bibliography or bibliographical references are the references to all cited document that a writer of scholarly work provides at the end of its text. Some departments and institutions call it a references list and ask students to write a separate bibliography of other works they read but did not cite. When you use the Harvard system, the reference list should be in an alphabetical order of author surnames.
You can cite all types of sources, and if you do, they should appear in the references list. It is essential to familiarize yourself with the Harvard Citation method to prevent penalization for wrong referencing.