Citing Podcasts and Websites

Over winter break I saw a capital Beyoncé meme that said, “If you liked it, you should have put a citation on it,” which made me laugh and reminded me of this listener question:

Hi, Grammar Girl. My name is Laura and I am a teacher of 9th-grade English and a big fan of your podcast. I've used your podcast in my classroom and the Quick and Dirty Tips definitely come in handy. My question is how do I cite your podcast and podcasts in general? Do you know of a website that keeps really up to date on how to cite things, especially citing things from the Web?

Thanks, Laura. All three of the major academic style players, the Modern Language Association (MLA), the American Psychological Association (APA), and The Chicago Manual of Style, have issued guidelines on how to cite electronic sources. 

The Purdue Online Writing Lab, affectionately known as OWL, has a huge 12-page chart that compares all the different citation types for all three styles. It looks like it was last update in 2014, so I checked all the current styles for citing websites and podcasts and made a small chart with examples:

APA (6th edition)

Podcast Episode

Fogarty, M. (Host). (2017, January 19). Citing podcasts and websites [Audio podcast]. Retrieved from http://ift.tt/2jSdI77

Web Page

Fogarty, M. (2017, January 19). Citing podcasts and websites. Retrieved from  http://ift.tt/2jSdI77

CMS (16th edition)

Podcast Episode

Fogarty, Mignon. “Citing Podcasts and Websites.” Grammar Girl’s Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing, podcast audio.  January 19, 2017. http://ift.tt/2jSdI77.

Web Page

Fogarty, Mignon. “Citing Podcasts and Websites.” Quick and Dirty Tips. January 19, 2017. Accessed January 25, 2017. http://ift.tt/2jSdI77

Note 1: The Chicago Manual of Style (16th ed, 14.7) says access dates are not required in Chicago style unless a publication date is unavailable, but it notes that teachers often require students to include an access date in citations. If the access date is included, it comes immediately after the publication date.

Note 2: I was confused about this for a while, so I’ll mention it here to save you time. Chicago puts the last name first in bibliographic entries, but the last name second in numbered notes. Further, items in notes are separated by commas, whereas items in bibliophilic entries are separated by periods. Many of the Chicago examples in sections related to podcasts and websites are formatted as notes and not bibliographic entries.

MLA (8th edition)

Podcast Episode

Fogarty, Mignon. “Citing Podcasts and Websites.” Grammar Girl’s Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing, ep. 552, January 19, 2017, http://ift.tt/2jSdI77

Web Page

Fogarty, Mignon. “Citing Podcasts and Websites.” Quick and Dirty Tips, Macmillan Holdings, LLC, January 19, 2017, http://ift.tt/2jSdI77

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Why Citations Are Important

First, people have asked me why it's important to include citations in the first place.

Aside from the fact that many teachers or editors require you to include citations in your work, including citations is necessary to acknowledge the people whose work you've incorporated into your document. Not including citations is a quick route to plagiarism: more commonly known as taking credit for someone else's words or ideas. Including citations is mandatory when you've drawn on someone else's original work or quoted someone verbatim.

Even when citations aren't necessary to avoid plagiarism, including citations helps people who want to learn more about your topic. Citations are a great starting point for further research. And including citations adds credibility to your writing. Frankly, I include citations at the end of most of my transcripts to head off people who disagree with my recommendations relating to points of style or topics where there are common misconceptions. I'm completely open to disagreement and discussion, but I don't just make this stuff up; I research every topic I cover. I'm almost always sorry when I don't include references on the website, and more than once, especially in the early years, I've gone back, reconstructed my work, and added them later.

Risks of Citing Electronic Sources

OK, so now that I've convinced you to include citations, it's time to think about the special risks of citing an electronic source like a website, podcast, or blog.

First, you have to determine whether it's a credible source, and second, you have to worry about whether it will still exist tomorrow.

Credibility

Determining whether a source is credible is subjective, but here are a few things to look for and consider:

• Can you tell who wrote the site? And if so, does the author seem to have any expertise in the area you are researching? The Stanford Cancer Center is likely to be a more credible source than Aunt Mary's Kancer Page.

• What are the credentials (or at least the stated credentials) of the author? I might take Aunt Mary more seriously if she is a board certified oncologist practicing at a well-known hospital or university.

• Can you tell when the page you are looking at was written? All else being equal, something written recently is generally more credible than something that hasn't been updated in years.

• Does the page cite other credible sources you can check? (There's that point about citations adding credibility again!)

• Does it sound too good to be true? If it does, it probably is.

• Is the site selling something based on the information it’s providing? If so, be wary.

• Do other credible sites link to the site? Many online tools let you see what sites link to other sites and pages. One free tool is the site explorer at moz.com.

• Are there a lot of typos? If there are a lot of language mistakes, it can mean that there are a lot of factual mistakes, too.

Finally, use common sense and evaluate the arguments yourself. It's up to you to determine whether a site's conclusions are actually supported by its statements.

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Permanence

You have control when you’re evaluating a site’s credibility, but you have less control over the fact that pages might disappear or change their Web address. If it's an important source, you should consider printing out the page or saving it on your own computer as HTML, a screenshot, or an audio or video file. If you find that a Web page is gone and you haven't had a chance to save it, you can search for a copy at the Internet Archive (also known as the Wayback Machine), at http://archive.org.

Despite the risks, an abundance of credible information resides on the Web, and you shouldn't dismiss a source simply because it is in an electronic format. The style guides let you cite live events you attended, which other people are much less likely to be able to revisit than a website or podcast. So cite away! Beyoncé would want you to do it.

Sources

“Citations of website content.” Chicago Manual of Style, sixteenth edition, 14.245. 

“Online magazine articles.” Chicago Manual of Style, sixteenth edition, 14.200.

“Published or broadcast interviews.” Chicago Manual of Style, sixteenth edition, 14.221.

“Works Cited: A Quick Guide.” MLA Style Center. http://ift.tt/2iZ7h44 (accessed January 16, 2017).

Gibson, Angela. “URLs: Some Practical Advice.” MLA Style Center. http://ift.tt/2fjSWLj (accessed January 16, 2016).

Lee, Chelsea. “How to Cite Something You Found on a Website in AP A Style.” APA Style. November 18, 2010. http://ift.tt/1r1AprC (accessed January 16, 2016).

(Note: We use a house style for fomatting sources.)

This article was originally published April 11, 2008 and updated January 18, 2017.