Conducting ethical and effective research requires citing source material. Not only do thorough and accurate citations ensure that writers give credit for their source materials, they also help other researchers to identify and track down potentially useful sources in their own work.
Many different citation styles exist. This guide does not include exhaustive guidance on all of them, but only for the three most commonly used citation formats in American academic research: Chicago/Turabian, MLA, and APA formats.
While every effort has been made to ensure that the information in this guide is accurate (as of March 2024), researchers and students should nonetheless make sure to carry out their own due diligence before submitting their work.
Citing archival materials can present challenges because of the wide variety of materials found in archival collections. Researchers might need to cite an unpublished manuscript of a book chapter, a postcard, a photo in an album, a hand-written receipt marking the sale of a painting, historical documents that have been photocopied, etc. Because of this variety, researchers should approach citing archival materials carefully and avoid using citation generating software. While automatic citation generators can be helpful for recently published material, they often get archival materials quite wrong.
This guide will indicate when citation styles require specific formats for different kinds of materials housed in archival collections.
Basic information to include in citations of archival sources:
1. Description and date of item, if available
- If the object has a title, for example "Self-portrait, 1999," include that. Otherwise, describe the item. For example, "Letter from Josephine Baker to Mark Baker, April 26, 1970."
- Since archival collections are not always described down to the item level, the researcher will often need to provide a description of items without titles. In this case, be sure to create descriptions consistently.
2. Name and number (identifier) of the collection
- Each CSWR collection has a name/title, as well as a unique identifier. Example: Maclovia Sanchez de Zamora Papers (MSS-898-BC).
- The collection name and identifier is necessary to find the collection again.
3. Box and folder or item number
- Archival collections often consist of multiple boxes of material, each containing multiple folders housing different materials.
- Including the folder number is vital to creating a thorough citation. Without it, even if a reader has the collection name and identifier they will have difficulty finding the original document again without knowing which folder it should be in.
- Note: some items in CSWR collect, especially in pictorial collections, will also include 10- or 11-digit item numbers. Include these numbers if they are there.
4. Repository information
- Center for Southwest Research and Special Collections, University Libraries, University of New Mexico
Note: Access to the MLA and Chicago online handbooks requires accessing them from a computer on campus at UNM or logging in to the library system if off campus.