Editing Encyclopedia:Citing sources (section)

===General references===
{{shortcut|WP:GENREF}}
A general reference is a citation to a reliable source that supports content, but is not linked to any particular text in the article through an [[Wikipedia:Inline citation|inline citation]]. General references are usually listed at the end of the article in a "References" section, and are usually sorted by the last name of the author or the editor. General reference sections are most likely to be found in underdeveloped articles, especially when all article content is supported by a single source. The disadvantage of general references is that [[#Text–source integrity|text–source integrity]] is lost, unless the article is very short. They are frequently reworked by later editors into inline citations.

The appearance of a general references section is the same as those given above in the sections on [[#Short citations|short citations]] and [[#Parenthetical referencing|parenthetical references]]. If both cited and uncited references exist, their distinction can be highlighted with separate section names, e.g., "References" and "General references".