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CDU Harvard Referencing: In-text Citations

A guide to help you better understand CDU Harvard Referencing

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   Frequently Asked Questions

CDU Harvard is an author-date style. This means your in-text citations need both of these two elements. There are two types of in-text citations, narrative citations and parenthetical citations.


Narrative Citations are a part of the sentence they are in.

  • For example: Smith (2019) found that due to...

If the citation is removed and the sentence no longer makes sense, you are using a narrative citation.


Parenthetical Citations are placed at the end of the information you are citing, in parentheses.

  • For example: ...was saved for future use (Smith 2019).

If the citation is removed and the sentence still makes sense, you are using a parenthetical citation.


An in-text citation can look different depending on the author. Have a look at the table below for in-text citation layouts.

Another layout for in-text citations

Author type Narrative Citation: First citation Narrative Citation: Subsequent citations Parenthetical Citation: First citation Parenthetical Citation: Subsequent citations
One work by one author Walker (2017) Walker (2017) (Walker 2017) (Walker 2017)
One work by two authors Walker and Allen (2014) Walker and Allen (2014) (Walker & Allen 2014) (Walker & Allen 2014)
One work by 3-20 authors Bradley et al. (2015) Bradley et al. (2015) (Bradley et al. 2015) (Bradley et al. 2015)
One work by 21+ authors Ahamad et al. (2015) Ahamad et al. (2015) (Ahamad et al. 2015) (Ahamad et al. 2015)
Groups/Organisations (readily identified through abbreviation) as author Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW 2018) AIHW (2018) (Australian Institute of Health and Welfare [AIHW] 2018) (AIHW 2018)
Groups/Organisations (no abbreviation) as author Diabetes Australia (2017) Diabetes Australia (2017) (Diabetes Australia 2017) (Diabetes Australia 2017)
Multiple sources in the same sentence, i.e. one sentence used ideas from several resources and needs to cite them in the same sentence

Diabetes Australia (2017), Parnell (2018) and Kerridge et al. (2013) discuss…

Can be in any order when narrative style

Parnell (2018), Kerridge et al. (2013) and Diabetes Australia (2017) discuss…

(Diabetes Australia 2017; Kerridge et al. 2013; Parnell 2018)

 

Must be alphabetical

(Diabetes Australia 2017; Kerridge et al. 2013; Parnell 2018)
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