AGLC4 Rule 7.6: Dictionaries

A dictionary entry is cited by the italic dictionary title, a bracket with the edition and year (or, online, the retrieval date), the headword in quotation marks and the definition number. Where a dictionary has several entries for the same word, the entry used is identified with the dictionary's own label, and any number in that label is superscript.

AGLC4 page 118

Format

Quoted from the Guide, page 118
Dictionary Title (Edition Number ed, Publication Year) ‘Entry Title’ (def Definition Number).
Dictionary Title (online at Date of Retrieval) ‘Entry Title’ (def Definition Number).

A boxed element is filled in with the source's details; everything outside a box is written exactly as shown.

Formatting

  • The dictionary title is italic.
  • For a print dictionary, the bracket holds the edition as an ordinal with a superscript suffix, a space, ed, a comma and the year of publication.
  • For an online dictionary, the bracket holds the words online at and the retrieval date.
  • The headword follows after a space, roman, in single curly quotation marks, with its accents and capitalisation as in the dictionary.
  • The definition follows after a space in round brackets as def and the definition number or code, for example def 2b.
  • Where there are several entries for the word, the dictionary's label for the entry comes first in that bracket, followed by a comma and the definition; a number in that label is superscript.
  • The definition bracket is omitted when the headword has a single definition.
  • The citation ends with a full stop.

Examples

Quoted from the Guide, page 118
  1. 59
    Macquarie Dictionary (5th ed, 2009) ‘demise’ (def 4).
  2. 60
    Chambers Dictionary (13th ed, 2014) ‘éclair’.
  3. 61
    Oxford English Dictionary (2nd ed, 1989) ‘school’ (v2, def 2b).
  4. 62
    Macquarie Dictionary (online at 20 February 2018) ‘punctilious’.
  5. 63
    Encyclopaedic Australian Legal Dictionary (online at 20 February 2018) ‘default judgment’ (def 1).

See also

Check your footnotes against these rules

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Formats, examples, passages, tables and the forms marked Not are quoted from the Australian Guide to Legal Citation (4th ed, Melbourne University Law Review Association, 2018), with the page of the Guide they appear on. Titles, summaries and explanations are our own.