How do you cite sources in a summary?

Summaries do require citations. Anything that isn't your original thought requires citation. I assign my students an annotated bibliography each year, and while they don't have to cite the summary - there is a citation right above it, they are required to cite any direct quotes they take from the material. We use MLA in the English department, and we teach students that while this isn't the only citation method, the framework they learn in class should make learning a new/different citation method easier in college or beyond.

Generally, a summary does not require any citation. Summary means we are summarizing anything in our way based on our perspective, expertise, and skills. However, if you are summarizing various sources in different paragraphs, then you can use any standard citation accordingly. Also, you can add a bibliography at the end.

Technically, a summary should be written in your own words to encapsulate a longer work, therefore you would need to include only a bibliography of works consulted in addition to noting the text you are summarizing. However, if you include anyone else’s ideas or words in your summary you should cite those sources in a footnote to prevent making your summary overly long, which defeats the purpose of a summary.

Agreed, making summaries is a good habit to have. But the ethics-mandated requirement or obligation to follow rules and formats is a burdensome task that not everybody is willing or able to follow. If you are a patron of a public library that subscribes to a few scientific publications but does not have information to the world of citation rules and formats, you may be stuck.

I prefer footnote citations. Less distracting in reading. All the information can be at the bottom of the page, so that it is easy to reference.

Citations at the bottom of the page are not particularly distracting Also those citations can be set aside and treated independently and at our convenience.

Making summaries should not imply that said summary will be submitted to a publisher of a professor in the capacity of an official gatekeeper. In conferences and workshops, the role of rapporteur is to summarize for others, but to my knowledge is not obliged to cite references.

A well written summary will not only be concise, but it will also be helpful to the reader. Keep on mind that the information you use for the summary is the most essential information the reader needs. Do not clutter your summary with unimportant information.

I often give a link to my online source even in a print format. Sometimes I give the link right away, sometimes at the end of an essay, chapter, or section. Of course, to use the link you must type it into a search engine. I am often limited by how many subscriptions I can afford. Occasionally I give author, title date and media to introduce a direct quote. I keep track of the articles I consult in documents which I call “interesting linx.” I number each document and when it is about 20 pages long I start a new one. I can save websites, links, quotes, and any thing I need to remember to these documents. I don’t use the formal structures for attribution right now, but I can access the proper forms online as needed.