How to prepare an annotated bibliography:

Find appropriate sources of information about your topic. See more detail about the research process in the appropriate section of this website.

• Once you have a starting list, examine each of them to answer the questions above for yourself.
• Properly format the sources according to the guidelines of the Chicago Manual of Style. Consult the section on the CMS on this website for further details. Organise them alphabetically by author's last name.
• After each reference, add a brief paragraph (50-100 words maximum) presenting your answers to the questions above. Your annotations can be descriptive (simply presenting the information) or analytical (providing a perspective on the source) depending on the nature of the research paper.
• Once you have created annotations for each source, read the bibliography as a whole and ask yourself whether there are gaps in your research that may require another trip to the library or another exploration of the databases. Remember that your bibliography will primarily be assessed for the extent to which it covers the chosen research topic with both appropriate breadth and depth.
• Ask yourself if there are any sources that may require additional information (if, for example, the author appears to lack academic credentials, but her / his point of view is still useful to your analysis). In such cases, the annotation may serve to explain or justify the use of a source that at first glance may look iffy.
• Formatting: The annotation should directly follow the bibliographical reference. No need to create a separate paragraph.