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Referencing Fundamentals: Formatting Harvard

Quotations

  • When quoting, always include page numbers in your in-text citation
  • The Harvard Style Guide specifies single quote marks for quotations
  • However, If your work is to be uploaded to Turnitin, place all quotations in double quote marks

Place names

  • Do not use full stops in abbreviated place names  (NY not N.Y.)
  • Where several places are listed on the title page, cite the first

In-text citations: punctuation

  • Insert a comma after the publication year, followed by the page number.  Example:  (Walsh 2022, p. 23)

Capitalisation

Capitalise the first word of the title, and any proper nouns in the title.

Examples
The heart is a lonely hunter
Midnight in Paris
All about the German shepherd dog
Antonio Carluccio's vegetables

Capitalise all words in the journal or newspaper title (not the article title), apart from minor words such as a, in, the, of, and, with etc

Examples
The Canberra Times
The Age
The Mail on Sunday
Journal of Food and Nutrition
Journal of Cell & Tissue Research

Page number abbreviations

  • Use p. for a single page (Example: Walsh 2022, p. 23)
  • Use pp. for a page range  (Example: Walsh 2022, pp. 21-30)

Citing and Referencing help

For more Harvard referencing examples please refer to the ERNI Referencing Tool.

Author's names

  • Cite the authors' names in the order they are listed on the book's title page
  • In-text references require author's surname only - initials are not necessary
  • Reference list citations require both author's surname and initial
  • When authors' names are written into the text of your assignment, do not use the ampersand (&).  The correct format is:  Wayne and Loomis (2023) contend ...
  • When the authors' names are included in brackets in the in-text citation, use the ampersand (&) before the last author.  The correct format is:  (Wayne & Loomis 2023).
  • In the reference list, include "&" before the last author's name.  Do not use "and".  The correct format is Williams, J Urlich, P & Taggerty, A.  
  • When creating an in-text citation for four or more authors, list the name of the first author followed by et al.
  • When creating a reference list citation for four or more authors, list all authors and do not use et al.

Editors

  • For a single editor, abbreviate to ed.
  • For several editors, abbreviate to eds (omit the full stop)

Editions

  • Use edn (no full stop) instead of edition
  • Use lower case for ed., eds and edn

Date unknown

Where the date of publication can't be found, consider using one of these options:

  • Search for the title in FindIt@.  The catalogue record may reveal the date.
  • Search Trove at the National Library.  They may have a record containing the correct date.
  • Use an approximate date, but only do this if you have evidence that the approximation is accurate within a small range of years. The approximate date entry in your citation will look like this: (Rigby c.2023) ("c." is an abbreviation of "circa", which is Latin for "around"). 
  • Use a question mark to indicate that the date is uncertain:  (Rigby 2023?)
  • Use "n.d." to indicate no known date: (Rigby n.d.) 
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