Time: 80 minutes Objectives of this lesson

LESSON 22
Topic: Critical Approach to Referencing
Time: 80 minutes
Objectives of this lesson:

• 
  To raise the awareness about referencing
  
• 
  Using references, citations, footnotes and quotations
  
• 
  Features
  
• 
  Materials:
  

1. 
   https://youtu.be/vFSbpoWzA_4
   
2. 
   Handouts, worksheets
   
3. 
   Presentation on the target topic
   

Key words:
To help show academic understanding and rigor you need to place your work within a framework or context that is relevant to the topic you are discussing. This context might, for example, include reference to data, or an exact quote, or a summary of what other people have had to say about the topic. There are many possible resources that you may refer to depending on your area of study.
As you develop your own ideas and arguments and use others’ work to support or contrast your views it is really important that you identify clearly which ideas are yours and which ideas or work belong to another person or source. You should always acknowledge any ideas and work that were not originally your own by providing a reference to the source of that information. Doing so is essential to avoid plagiarism. In academic work, referencing is the appropriate acknowledgement of: Ideas and work that originate from another person Information that you have included in your work that comes from some other source (which is not common knowledge or widely accepted). The terms cite and refer (or citation and reference) are often used to mean the same thing since to cite a piece of work is to provide a reference to its source. Referencing is important because it:
 Helps show that you have been thorough and careful (or rigorous) in your academic work
 Indicates what material is the work of another person or is from another source
 Indicates what material is your original work since you have provided a citation for work that is not your own
 Allows the reader to refer back to any external material (i.e., not your own) that you have stated or discussed
 Provides the reader with an indication of the quality and authority of the material you are referencing (e.g., published article in a respected journal, unpublished opinion piece on a popular online website) Of course the relevance and importance of material is dependent on your topic
 Lets the reader see if you have included up-to-date work, seminal (early and influential) work, and material central to your research topic

What do I need to reference? You should always provide a reference to all material that you:

 Quote
 Paraphrase
 Summarise

You should also provide a reference to any:

 Ideas you are using in your work that originate with someone else
 Data or other information that is not common knowledge, is controversial, or is specialised knowledge

Note that where the source of your information came from (e.g., social media, TED talk, newspaper, journal, government report) does not determine whether or not you need to provide a reference. Nor does it matter whether the source of your information has been officially published (although this may have an impact on the credibility and authority of the material).

There are two main systems used in the United Kingdom: the Harvard system (sometimes referred to as the Author-Date system) and the British Standard (Numeric) system. Descriptions of these systems are provided below, together with examples of their use. There are two main rules for quotations, whichever system you use.

› If you are quoting something that is up to three lines in length then you can generally incorporate this directly into the body of your text; anything longer should be indented in its own paragraph.

› If you need to include any words of your own to help make sense of the quotation, make sure they appear in square brackets to make it clear that these are not part of the quote itself.

For example: “That [moving] line established the efficiency of the method and we now use it everywhere.” The main difference between the two referencing systems is that they have different ways of referencing within the text. In terms of the reference list at the end of the document however, they are very similar with just a few minor differences.