Chicago Style Paper Format : What Pages Do I Need With My Chicago (Turabian) Style Paper?

If you are writing a thesis or dissertation or any formal paper using Chicago (Turabian) Style, you have several options for deciding which pages to include in your paper. Some pages are required, while others are optional for your thesis or dissertation. I have listed the page descriptions (below) in the order in which they should appear in your Chicago (Turabian) Style paper. Always start each of these sections on a new page. Most of them will only require one page.

A) TITLE. On the title page, which is required, all text must be double-spaced using uppercase characters. Center the text both horizontally and vertically. Begin with the name of the educational institution, followed by the title. Next, list the committee to which you're submitting the dissertation or thesis, along with the department or college for which you're submitting it. Then include the word "BY" on a separate line, followed by the author's name. Finally, place the city and state where you wrote the paper, along with the month and year of graduation. Place extra horizontal lines between each section on the title page, allowing you to center it vertically on the paper. Keep in mind that the title page is the first of the "display" pages in Chicago (Turabian) Style, but you do not number it.

B) COPYRIGHT PAGE OR BLANK PAGE. This page is immediately after the title page, and you need to either include a copyright notice or leave the page blank. The blank (or mostly blank) page prevents characters on the first main text page from bleeding through the title page. For the copyright, near the bottom of the page, type "Copyright," the copyright symbol, the year the paper was written, and the name of the author. On the next line, indent and type, "All rights reserved" with no punctuation marks. Do not number this page, either, but you do count it in your pagination. The next display page will be "iii" in roman numerals.

C) DEDICATION. A dedication page is an optional page. Simply type "To" followed by the name of the person(s) to which you want to dedicate the paper.

D) EPIGRAPH PAGE. The epigraph page, which may contain a poem or quotation, is optional.

E) TABLE OF CONTENTS. The table of contents is an optional page, and it should be numbered as part of the display pages. It is an organized listing of the contents of the paper, providing page numbers to the various sections and headings in the paper. The reader can use the table of contents to jump to a particular section of the paper. When listing chapter headings in the table of contents, make sure they exactly match the chapter headings in the text. Use a leader to connect the chapter heading or section name (aligned on the left) with the page number (aligned on the right). Type "CONTENTS" or "TABLE OF CONTENTS" centered at the top of the page.

F) LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS AND LIST OF TABLES. These optional pages are part of the display pages, and you should only use them if you have illustrations and tables in your paper. List each illustration or table with the appropriate title and page number, connected by a leader. Right-align the page number and left-align the title of each table or figure.

G) PREFACE. The preface is another optional display page. The author can list the motivation for the project and acknowledgements.

H) LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS OR GLOSSARY. If you have a lot of odd abbreviations or terms in your paper, you can list them on one of these optional pages.

I) ABSTRACT. Use an abstract page to briefly summarize the contents of the thesis or dissertation. It's an optional display page.

J) MAIN TEXT. Begin numbering the main text with Arabic numerals, and you should no longer use the lowercase roman numerals from the display pages. Each Arabic page number should appear in the upper right corner of each page. If you have a chapter heading or another type of main heading at the top of a page, you may center the page number at the bottom of the page.

K) APPENDIX. Use the optional appendix page(s) for material that doesn't quite fit into the main text, such as complex tables or technical notes. You may have more than one appendix. Each appendix should deal with a different idea or topic. Number them either with letters or numbers, such as "Appendix A" and "B" and "C," for example.

L) BIBLIOGRAPHY OR REFERENCE LIST. Include your bibliography after the final main text page or appendix page on a new page. The reference list page should include all works that you've cited in your paper, listed alphabetically. (We'll discuss citing references in another article.) Make sure you continue the Arabic page numbering throughout the bibliography pages.