Harvard citation rmit

Overview for referencing in written reports,

essays and assignments

College of Business

Dr Peter Chomley

The academic challenge: Understanding how

you communicate

The RMIT College of Business Guidelines are based on the Style manual for

authors, editors and printers (2002), referred to here as Style manual (2002)

which is published on behalf of the Commonwealth of Australia, and is the

Commonwealth Government’s preferred style. The Style manual (2002) can be

used to provide guidance on areas which are not covered in the RMIT Business

document, but if there is any inconsistency you should follow the RMIT

Business document.

RMIT University 2018 College of Business v.4 2010 2

What is referencing?

• Referencing means acknowledging someone else’s work or ideas. It is

sometimes called ‘citing’ or ‘documenting’ another person’s work.

• Referencing is a basic University requirement.

• It is mandatory for all students to cite or acknowledge information that has

come from other sources.

• Without appropriate referencing students are in effect ‘stealing’ the work of

others - this is tantamount to academic fraud.

There are consequences if students fail to reference their assignments. These

may include:

• Reduction in marks for assessment tasks.

• Failure in a course of study.

• Expulsion from a program.

Note: The Harvard system has many variations. You must use this version

known as the AGPS style.

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When do I reference?

You reference whenever you have used a piece of information that comes from

• Text books

• Journals

• Published papers, (e.g. conference or working paper)

• Newspapers

• Websites

• TV/Radio interviews

• Personal communication

• Others

You must cite the origins of the information you are using, whether you have

copied the words directly or whether you have paraphrased.

• If in doubt----REFERENCE!

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Referencing

Whenever you rely on someone else’s work you must acknowledge that by

providing details of the source.

In this system, each reference is indicated in two areas of your work:

• in the text (in-text citation) by using the name of the author(s) and the date of

publication of the work.

• In the reference list, where the full details of each reference, including the title

and publishing details are given

In-text citations

There are two ways of referencing in-text:

• Paraphrasing - ideas of the author(s) are expressed in your own words.

• Direct quotes

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How to reference in-text

There are two options for in-text referencing

• Adding the citation at the end of the sentence.

• Using the author’s name as part of your sentence.

• When paraphrasing include the author’s name and date of publication.

e.g.

– Lack of variability in a product is an important measure of its quality

(Shannon 2003).

OR

– Shannon (2003) describes the role of statistics in minimising product

variability.

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General rules for reference in-text (1)

Where the name(s) of the authors are given:

• For books, journals, websites, conference papers and newspapers, the

general rule is to use the family name and the date.

7

One author