Citing Resources in ASA (American Sociological Association) Style

The ASA citation style is typically used by sociology.

Current copies of the American Sociological Association Style Guide can be found on RESERVE at:
HM73. A54 1996.

Remember that your list of resources should be presented in alphabetical order by author's last name.

Sample Citations
Online Resources

 
Sample Citations
 
When writing a citation in the ASA style, pay particular attention to italics, punctuation, indentation, and capitalization. With the ASA Style, quotations and borrowed phrases are indicated as such within the text, with the author's name and page number cited in parentheses. This variation is used instead of footnotes or endnotes.
Many more samples of citations presented in the ASA style can be found in the American Sociological Association Style Guide. Please consult this book or a librarian for help with unusual resources.

All of the following samples are taken from:

American Sociological Association. 1996. American Sociological Association
      Style Guide. 1st ed. Washington, DC: American Sociological Association.
(Sample of book with edition specified.)


Book with More Than One Author:
Note: italicize the title of the book and capitalize all important words in titles. Indentation is important, as is the order of the authors names.

Berlin, Gorden and Andrew Sum. 1988. Toward a More Perfect Union: Basic
     Skills, Poor Families, and Our Economic Future. New York: Ford
     Foundation.



Book with an Editor:

Koshar, Rudy, ed. 1990. Splintered Classes. New York: Holmes and Meier.

Scholarly Article:
Note: Article titles are set off with "quotation marks" and italicize the title of the journal. This sample includes a volume number (79) and an issue number (4). Note that there is no period after the title of the journal.

Goodman, Leo A. 1947. "The Analysis of Systmes of Qualitative Variables When
     Some of the Variables Are Unobservable. Par I - A Modified Latent Structure
     Approach." American Journal of Sociology 79 (4): 1179-259.
     

Newspaper Article:
Note: Italicize the title of the newspaper.

Guiles, Melinda and Krystal Miller. 1990. "Mazda and Mitsubishi-Chrysler
     Venture Cut Output, Following Big Three's Lead." Wall Street Journal.
     January 12, pp. A2, A12.


     

Website:
Note: No italics.

American Sociological Association. 2000. "Scholarship of Teaching and Learning
      Workshop." Washington, DC: American Sociological Association, Retrieved
      May 5, 2000 (http://www.asanet.org/members/socwkshp.html).
(This sample from the California State ASA Web Guide.

 

 

Online Resources
Samples of papers written using the ASA style can be found at the following websites:

American Sociological Association
Quick Style Guide for Students Writing Sociology Papers.

ASA Format Guide
Samples from California State University Library.

Updated: November 21, 2005