Question about #citations in #academic work: Where does one put the author in citations, in which THE WORK is included in the sentence, as in (a) vs (b) below?
(a) "... which you can find in Chomsky (1981)"
(b) "... which you can find in (Chomsky, 1981)"
@tschfflr
With my meek 7 yearsbin academia proper, I'd also go for (a). When I've seen examples of (b), it disturbs my reading much more than (a) does. @linguistics
@tschfflr@linguistics However the publisher's style guide says to or use whatever the convention in the venue is. (a) isn't bad, but I'm sure there's some venue out there that insists on (b) because whoever set their policy believes you shouldn't construct sentences that way.
I prefer citation styles like IEEE that use numbered citations and square brackets.
References (internal or external) are part of the sentence, set parentheses like you would do with other interjections:
"…which you can find in Eq. (1)"
vs.
*"…Which you can find in (Eq. 1)",
but:
*"In Einstein's equation for special relativity Eq. (1)…"
vs.
"In Einstein's equation for special relativity (Eq. 1)…"
@tschfflr@linguistics It is noteworthy that in both examples (equations and Harvard-style references), the parenthesis around the numbers are a matter of stylistic choice. The correct way for both should be "(see Eq. (1))"/"as in Eq. (1)" and (cf. Chomsky (1990))"/"according to Chomsky (1990)", but most style guides discourage double parenthesis, so they are omitted when the reference as a whole is already parenthesized.
@tschfflr@linguistics Since it's in narrative, almost certainly option a. It ultimately depends on the style the journal uses, but I can't think of a style that uses option b in narrative.
@tschfflr@linguistics Chomsky (1981) would be more common, but every journal seems to have its slightly own rules for referencing so the only safe way is to read those rules.
@linguistics Alright I see everyone’s preferences are different from mine, but this is VERY weird when there are several authors! “We follow the approach in x, y & z (2022)” What is really needed is a reference to a work, not a person.
Btw, the “linguistic” arguments are moot, since entities written in parentheses can definitely be complements of prepositions, see “an example is found in (3)”. @minimalparts@dingemansemark
@tschfflr I would say that 'an example is found in (3)' is qualitatively different than 'which you can find in (Chomsky, 1981)' because Chomsky is uniquely identifiable whereas 3 isn't.
My personal preference is (a), but I would read the rules for the journal. @linguistics@minimalparts@dingemansemark
@tschfflr@linguistics citations shouldn't be placeholders for names or studies, but mere references. Therefore it's a), sentence b) is missing an object. An alternative to b would be "Fact (c.f. Chomsky, 1981)".
Add comment