If you are looking for an article that suggests everything related to Citation, you are reading the right one at the moment. For answers to questions like “How to cite a blog” or “How to cite a blog APA,” we are covering it in this article. If You are writing a research paper or any scholarly essay, it is essential to cite its sources.
Sometimes, sources include websites and blogs, and people get confused about how to cite a blog in the paper.
To help you out, we have decided to write this ultimate concise citation guide. Make sure to read this till the end to take out absolute value from this write-up.
How to Cite a Blog: The Citation and its importance
Every year thousands, if not millions of students enrolled in Ph.D. or research programs, requiring them to write at least one research paper during the entire period. Whether you are a student, a professor, or a scientist, writing a scholarly article or essay and publishing it in a reputed journal is a prerequisite to gain credibility in your field of expertise.
However, writing a paper is not like writing an email or general article. There are a set of methods, styles, if you call it, to write an essay. These methods are considered appropriate as per the standards of academia. Your paper will stand out from the subpar documents that are regularly submitted to the journals if you follow those guidelines.
Coming to Citation, what is it, and why is it so crucial in the academic world?
Well, Citation is an essential part of the research papers or scholarly writings. We often have to borrow ideas from the findings of others. We have to build the stack of our conclusions on a foundation that includes knowledge and ideas that are not initially ours.
So, it’s best practice to give the author or anyone the proper credit from where you are borrowing the idea/reference. The Citation and bibliography exist to serve the purpose of citing the sources mentioned in the material.
How to Cite a Blog: Benefits of Citation
Providing the Citation is an essential requirement while writing anything in academia. Below are two benefits of citing the sources in your material:
Credit to Author:
When you properly cite the sources of ideas and information incorporated in your material, your readers and other academics can use that Citation to dig further during their intellectual inquiry. If you don’t cite any source, it means your work’s credibility is doubtful—besides, not all of your work is maybe 100% original with no borrowing from others’ work.
Avoid Plagiarism:
Plagiarism is rampant in today’s world. And it’s not limited to only businesses. It’s prevalent in academia, more common than you think. However, blatantly plagiarising means facing severe repercussions from losing reputation to outright debarment.
Either way, it’s not ethical to plagiarise others’ work. It can ensure legal action too, which is not suitable for anyone thinking of building a career.
Sometimes, writers end up citing a source in their material like this:
https:papers.example.edu/sciencejournals/docview/99912349/FCH4760000FDM345QFP/9?accountid=13440
Now, you did not know the place from where you have inserted the information, but there are two problems:
What if the URL doesn’t work or breaks in the future?
What if the source you have cited is a paid website, which requires the readers to have login credentials or pay for a subscription to read?
And third, this format is not professional.
That’s why you need to follow proper techniques while mentioning the bibliography. We will tell you about the styles that are mostly used in Citation.
Techniques of Citation
Like there is more than one way to write a letter, there are many techniques to cite sources in the papers or articles. If you are writing an essay, you should know how many styles are there and where they are used. If you know where they are used, it will be easier to pick the one apt for your subject or field of research.
APA, MLA, and Chicago are three distinct citation styles that are commonly used throughout the world. However, there are differences between all three.
APA stands for the American Psychology Association, which is primarily used by those writing paper related fields like Education, Psychology, and Sciences.
MLA stands for Modern Language Association responsible for setting standards for citing sources in a scholarly paper. This style uses two parenthetical documentation styles for Citation. If you are writing an essay for humanities, it’s best to opt for MLA Citation Style.
Chicago/Turabian is a standard for Citation prevalent in papers related to Fine Arts, Business, and History.
How to Cite a Blog With No Author
Before the internet’s rise, there was a time when mostly citations included information from other papers, books, journals, newspapers, or magazine articles. Now, even ebooks or blogs are used as a source of information.
If you are preparing a paper that includes ideas from a generic blog with no author, you must be wondering how to cite a blog with no author or cite a blog APA with no author in the material.
We know that you don’t want to plagiarise the source, but there is no author to give credit to, and that’s fine. You can still provide a citation without having to worry about plagiarising. The following are methods on how to cite a blog.
APA:
Structure of Citation:
Title of the webpage/article mentioned. (Year, Month Date on which it’s published). Retrieved from URL
Example:
Office of the United States Trades Representative: U.S.-India Trade Facts. (2020, October 2). Retrieved from https://ustr.gov/countries-regions/south-central-asia/india
MLA 8:
Structure of Citation:
“Title of the Webpage or the Article.” Title of the Website, Publisher’s Name, Date Published, URL
Example:
“What’s So Special About Glacier Bay?.” National Park Service, National Park & Preserve Alaska, 2020, https://www.nps.gov/glba/whats-so-special.htm
Chicago:
Structure of Citation:
“Title of Article.” Website’s Title. Publication Month Date, Year. URL.
Example: “Can Trump win? Yes. But the path is narrow and difficult.” The Economic Times. October 22, 2020. https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/international/world-news/can-trump-win-yes-but-the-path-is-narrow-and-difficult-/articleshow/78808004.cms?from=mdr.
Final Words
Above are three commonly used styles that are used to cite sources in articles and papers. If you are looking for how to cite a blog, we hope that this article has given you the proper guidelines to write a good essay. If you have any queries, make sure to drop them in the comments. Follow us for more information and the latest updates.
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There is certainly a great deal to find out about this topic. I really like all of the points you have made.