Citation 101

Once you start collecting sources for a project, you may find yourself with loads of articles or other materials to sift through - ever wish there was a tool that could help you do that? Say hello to Zotero, the citation management software!

Zotero is a free tool that you can download onto your computer that does a lot of things for you:

• grab PDFs and webpage links from your browser and import them into your personal Zotero library
• organize and search your Zotero library by creating folders, assigning tags, and more
• set up an online Zotero account to sync your library across computers and online
• form groups with other Zotero members to share items from your libraries
• create in-text citations and works cited lists in any citation style using Zotero's plugins for Word and Google Docs

All you need is to go to Zotero.org to download both the free application for Windows/Mac and connector for your Chrome or other browsers (use links below).

Zotero is great for keeping all your research resources in one spot, and it has the ability to grab citation information from the things you import to create citations for you automatically. It isn't perfect, and you should always double check that the information is correct, but it's a good way to get started, and it's especially nice for sharing sources with your partners in a group project.

Getting Started with Zotero - Video made by Laurier Library (2020), taken from Youtube