Style Manuals

• William Strunk, Jr., The Elements of Style

• The Chicago Manual of Style, available to all enrolled members of the University of Illinois via the University of Illinois Library’s subscription.

Use the “Quick Guide” first (see the link at the top of the page). It is the best place to start. The manual as a whole is detailed and can be overwhelming at first. You will be able to utilize the full manual more efficiently after you have a basic understanding of the various parts of a Chicago Style citation. Alternatively, explore the Color-Coded Guide to Chicago Citation Style (a visual quick reference page created by the University of Illinois Library).

Academic Integrity

For information on the reasons for source citations, and for help with paraphrasing, quoting, citing, plagiarism (and how to avoid it), and copyright, see What is Academic Integrity?

Dictionaries

• The Oxford English Dictionary. This dictionary is “the” dictionary when it comes to the English language. It has detailed, comprehensive entries on word meaning, usage, and etymology. It is available to all members of the University of Illinois via the University of Illinois Library’s subscription.
• VisuWords. A graphical dictionary/thesaurus that allows you to see the relations between words, concepts, and associations.

Philosophy Resources

Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
A well-regarded online encyclopedia of people, terms, and concepts in philosophy. Created by Standford University and freely available.

Philosopher’s Index
A database of article, book, and anthology citations about philosophers, philosophical concepts, etc. Available to U of I students via the University of Illinois Library’s subscription.

Online Tutorials 

Using Research
Text tutorials from the Purdue University Online Writing Lab (OWL). The OWL has created excellent guides on quoting, paraphrasing, and summarizing; avoiding plagiarism; and fair use. Also has a paraphrasing exercise.

LEARN tutorials
Created by the University of Illinois Library to help students figure out how to search databases effectively, use the Library’s Online Catalog, distinguish scholarly from non-scholarly books, find dissertations, and more.