: Citing in a Magazine Article I write a ton of magazine articles online. My editor tells me you do not need a works cited as you do in academic work. I am wondering what kind of citing you

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It all depends on how formal you want to be, and how likely readers are to want to check your sources.

If you are writing about some controversial topic, like politics or contentious social issues, then I'd give citations so opponents can't accuse you of just making stuff up. If you were writing scholarly papers -- which you say you're not -- I'd include sources so other scholars can verify and follow up on your research.

But if you're writing chatty articles, putting citations could look pretentious, and be more effort than it's worth.

When in doubt, give a citation. It's not THAT much effort. I've gotten burned a few times because I didn't include a citation and then later someone asked me for sources, or I wanted to write something further on the same subject and I had no record of where I'd gotten my original information.

Of course if your editor or publisher says not to give citations, and if you put them in they just rip them out, then I guess there's not much point.

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