Did you know you can cite private letters and emails in your work? Here, we’ll explain how to cite personal communications in IEEE referencing.
In IEEE referencing, a “private communication” can be many things, including:
Essentially, it covers any communications between individuals that aren’t publicly available. These are not, traditionally, considered scholarly sources. As such, you should always cite a more reliable source if one is available (e.g., a published book or journal article would be a better source in most cases).
However, private communications can be useful sometimes. For example, if you email an expert to clarify something they discuss in a published paper, you could cite your correspondence as a supplement to the published source.
If you do need to cite personal communications, moreover, IEEE style has a specific format to follow. Read on below to find out how this works.
In-text citations in IEEE referencing use numbers in square brackets:
According to Steiner [3], the rover’s navigation system allows it to detect and circumvent hazardous terrain during its descent through the atmosphere.
These numbers point to sources in the reference list, numbered in the order you cite them (i.e., the first source is [1], the second source is [2], and so on).
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For more on how to format IEEE citations, see our blog post on the topic.
In an IEEE reference list, the basic format for any private communication is:
[#] INITIAL(S). Surname, private communication, month, year.
For instance, the reference for an email from Elon Musk might look like this:
[2] E. Musk, private communication, Apr. 2020.
As shown above, you may need to abbreviate the month here. This applies to any month with five or more letters. To abbreviate a month, simply use the first three letters followed by a period (e.g., “August” becomes “Aug.”). However, you won’t need to abbreviate “May,” “June,” or “July” as these are all under five letters long.
As you can see above, citing a personal communication in IEEE style is simple. However, if you’d like to make sure your references are error free, try our free proofreading trial today and find out how expert editing can help!
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