How to Cite a Book in Turabian Format (Bibliography and Footnote)

Turabian is a citation format developed by Kate L. Turabian specifically for student dissertations, and has grown popular for use among history students. It allows a reader to quickly process sources and follow an author's paper trail clearly, without breaking up the pace of a paper. If you are a history student specifically, or maybe even just a student writer in general that wants a strong citation format, Turabian is a great one to know.

Step 1: Gather Your Materials

You will need the three things listed above. The first two should be readily accessible. If you do not know how to find the key information in a book, it is all on the cover and the first few pages of the book (before the content starts). The information for the made up example is as follows, for those of you who wish to use it.

Author Name: Bob Smith

Book Title: Made Up

Book Subtitle: This Book

Publishing Location: A Far Away Land

Publisher: Made Up Press

Year Published: 2016

You will first learn how to do the bibliography citation, and then be shown the format for the footnotes.

Step 2: The Author's Name

In a Turabian bibliography, the first thing you need to write down is the author's name following an indent and a numbering. You must do it with the following steps:

1) Tab

2) Number

3) Period and Space

4) Author's Last Name

5) Comma

6) Author's First Name

7) Period

Note- If you have two authors, more than two authors, a translator, or other circumstance, there is a specific way to handle this in Turabian, which can be found online or in Turabian's book, which will both be listed at the end.

Step 3: Step Three: Title and Subtitle

After the author is accounted for, you must add in the book's title and, if it has one, subtitle. You must use the following format where steps in brackets are only needed if the book has a subtitle:

1) Title

[ 2) Colon ]

[ 3) Subtitle ]

4) Period

Note- You MUST italicize this entire step, or else it is incorrect.

Step 4: Step Four: Location of Publication

The next thing you need is the location in which the source was published. Remember to turn of italics before filling in this step in the following format:

1) Location (either just raw location, or a City, State format, such as New York City, NY)

2) Colon

Step 5: Step Five: Publisher

Next you must write down the publisher in the following format:

1) Publisher

2) Comma

This step also displays how to handle a multi-line citation. When your citation hits the second line, make sure to keep it aligned to the left with no spacing.

Step 6: Step 6: Year Published

The last step in a Turabian bibliographical citation is the year the source was published, which you must do in the following format.

1) Year (numerical)

2) Period

Step 7: Learn the Formula

In the image for this step, you will see a second citation, this has the generic formula for a single author book citation in Turabian. You can see that this works with the citation that you just finished, including punctuation and italics.

It should be noted that a Turabian bibliography is normally organized alphabetically by last name. The second citation should thus be switched with the first in this example, you are just seeing it in this order for learning purposes.

Step 8: Learn the Footnote Formula

Footnotes are necessary every time you use a source, whether as a quote, paraphrase, or just a general information giver. There are two types of footnotes:

1) Long form- You only use this form, shown as footnote 1 above, the first time a source is used in the paper.This is just a slight variation of the bibliography form that also includes page numbers.

2) Short form- You must use this form, shown as footnote 1 above, every time you use a source in the paper after it after the first time. This simple form has just three parts, no more or less.

PAGE NUMBERS ARE NECESSARY WHEN CITING. This is so a reader can follow your evidence quickly and easily, which is one of the reasons this format is so prevalent in history.

Before moving to the next step, you should try to do the two footnote formats using the made-up book.

Note- To add a footnote in Microsoft Word, press alt+control+f. Always do this directly after the punctuation in a sentence, you can see an example in the first picture of this Instructable.

Step 9: Check Your Footnotes

If the footnotes you filled in on the last step look like the ones above, then you have done them correctly, if not, find your mistakes and try again.

Once you have this part mastered you can officially do book citations in Turabian Format.