In-text Citation
The brief marker within a sentence, such as an author-date pair or a number, that points to a full entry in the reference list.
An in-text citation is the short pointer placed in the body of your writing at the spot where a source is used. Depending on the citation style, it may be a parenthetical author and year, a superscript number, or a bracketed number, and it links directly to a full entry in the reference list. Its job is to show precisely which claim comes from which source, so it belongs next to the borrowed idea, not vaguely at the end of a paragraph.
In a thesis, in-text citations carry the burden of attribution sentence by sentence. Placing them precisely tells examiners which statements are yours and which are borrowed, which is exactly the distinction plagiarism checks probe. When quoting directly, most styles also require a page or paragraph number so a reader can find the exact passage.
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