What is CMS?
The Chicago Manual of Style (CMS) is the preferred formatting and style guidelines used by the disciplines of history, philosophy, religion, and the arts. This quick reference guide focuses on how to format the title page, the notes, and bibliography citations in Chicago Manual Style 17 edition.
Title Page
In CMS, a title page is required. To make a title page in CMS...
- Set margins to 1” on each side
- Do not put a page number on the title page
- Use readable font, preferably Times New Roman, 12 pt.
- Center your title a third of the way down on the title page
- Title and Subtitle (if applicable) should be in bold font, title case, and the size may be slightly larger than the body text
- Center the following information 7-8 lines down from the title
- Your First and Last Name
- The Course Number and Title
- The Due Date of the Paper
Example Title Page
First Page
The first page of your document should include:
- Page number (start at page 1)
- A section heading (if your instructor requires it) that is bold and slightly larger than the rest of the text
- A skipped line after the heading
- Introduction to your paper
Sample First Page
Notes
A note is used as a citation after you have included information from a source within your paper. As an example, if you are including a quote from Joan Scott’s Gender and the Politics of History in your paper, directly after the quote, you would include a note of the citation information. These numbers correspond to footnotes at the bottom of the page. The first time that you refer to a source, you will write a full citation, but each time you reference that source again with a paraphrase or a quote, you will include a shortened citation in the note.
To create these footnotes, click on the “References” tab in your MS Word document. Then select the “Insert Footnote” option.
Bibliography
In CMS, in addition to using a note to cite your source within the paper, you will also include a list of all the sources you used as a bibliography. The bibliography list should be the final page of your paper.
- Center the word Bibliography at the top of the page, make it bold, and increase font size the same as all earlier headings
- Skip two lines before first entry
- List entries in alphabetical order
- Single space each entry, but allow one blank space between each entry
- Use a 0.5" handing indent for each entry
Formatting Examples of Notes and Bibliography
RefWorks includes a citation builder tool that can help you to easily set up both in-text and reference citations. See the "Creating Reference Citations" section on the Library's RefWorks Job Aide.
For detailed help making CMS notes and bibliography entries, look to the examples found below:
Notes
- Sarah Palmer, “How to Do Basically Anything,” Journal of Historical Initiatives 17 (2013): 133, https://doi.org/1980.4947654.
- Palmer, “Basically Anything,” 134.
Bibliography
Palmer, Sarah. “How to do Basically Anything.” Journal of Historical Initiatives 17 (2013): 133-35. https://doi.org/1980.4947654.
Notes:
- Rebecca Cox, The College Fear Factor (Harvard University Press, 2009), 17.
- Cox, Fear Factor, 28.
Bibliography:
Cox, Rebecca D. The College Fear Factor. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2009.
Notes:
- Ramos Tobin, “UPS Profit Nearly Doubles in Second Quarter,” Atlanta Journal-Constitution, July 22, 2010, https://www.ajc.com/business/ups-profit-nearly-doubles-second-quarter/fB7gpjpNrXtVD2uwf8YVqL/.
- Tobin, “UPS Profit.”
Bibliography:
Tobin, Ramos, “UPS Profit Nearly Doubles in Second Quarter,” Atlanta Journal-Constitution, July 22, 2010. http://www.ajc.com/business/ups-profit-nearly-doubles-second-quarter/fB7gpjpNrXtVD2uwf8YVgL/.
Notes:
- “Police and Detectives,” U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics, accessed on September 3, 2015, http://www.bls.gov/oco/pdf/ocos160.pdf.
- “Police and Detectives.”
Bibliography:
U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics. “Police and Detectives.” Accessed September 3, 2015. http://www.bls.gov/oco/pdf/ocos160.pdf.
Notes:
- Karen A. Rader and Victoria E. Cain, Life on Display: Revolutionizing U.S. Museums of Science and Natural History in the Twentieth Century (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2014), 80-83.
Bibliography:
Rader, Karen A. and Victoria E. Cain. Life on Display: Revolutionizing U.S. Museums of Science and Natural History in the Twentieth Century. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2014.
Note:
- Susan Leigh Star, “Craft vs. Commodity, Mess vs. Transcendence: How the Right Tool For the Job Became the Wrong One in the case of Taxidermy and Natural History” in Adela. E. Clarke and Joan H. Fujimura, The Right Tools for the Job: At Work in the Twentieth-Century Life Sciences (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992), 257-286.
Bibliography:
Star, Susan Leigh. “Craft vs. Commodity, Mess vs. Transcendence: How the Right Tool For the Job Became the Wrong One in the case of Taxidermy and Natural History,” in The Right Tools for the Job: At Work in the Twentieth-Century Life Sciences. Edited by Adela E. Clarke. and Joan H Fujimura. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992.
Note:
- James H Johnson, “Opera as Social Duty,” in Listening in Paris: A Cultural History (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996), 15.
Bibliography:
Johnson, James H. “Opera as Social Duty.” In Listening in Paris: A Cultural History, 9-34. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996.
Note:
- Ho Chi Minh, “Declaration of Independence of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (1945)” in Voices of Decolonization: A Brief History with Documents, edited by Todd Shepard (Boston: Bedford St. Martin’s Press, 2015), 49-52.
Bibliography:
Minh, Ho Chi. “Declaration of Independence of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (1945).” In Voices of Decolonization: A Brief History with Documents, edited by Todd Shepard, 49-52. Boston: Bedford St. Martin’s Press, 2015.
Note:
- Thomas Paine, The American Crisis (1819; repr., London: R.Carlisle, 2015), 37, https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=jUVHAQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&hl=en&pg=GBS.PP7.
Bibliography:
Paine, Thomas. The American Crisis. 1819. Reprint, London: R. Carlisle, 2015. https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=jUVHAQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&hl=en&pg=GBS.PP7.