Science in Society

What about footnotes/ bibliographies/ references?

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Referencing in popular science articles is different

Do not reference obvious or generally agreed facts (e.g. HIV causes Aids or SA has high unemployment).

  • Avoid footnotes and long bibliographies below articles coupled with “(Smith, 2018)” in text.
  • Rather do the following and hyperlink to the source:
    • “In a 2018 study, Prof John Smith from Stellenbosch University led a team of limnologists who looked at the quality of river water …”
    • “In 2010, researchers from Oxford University found that religious communities in rural England were more likely to …”
    • John Smith highlighted the need for access to mental-health care services in a paper, Hitting a low during lockdown, published in The Lancet in August 2020.
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Link to the next section:

  1. Who is my target audience?
  2. What do I want to share?
  3. What should my word count be?
  4. How do I structure an article?
  5. How can I use stories in my communication?
  6. I need help with language and style
  7. What about footnotes/bibliographies/references?
  8. Tick box
  9. Talking about the HSRC: Are we diluting our brand?
  10. Focus on the researcher: Conveying the So What? and writing a short biography
  11. How do I structure a PowerPoint presentation?
  12. How do I take a useful photograph?
  13. How do I plan the structure of a short video?
  14. Useful links on science communication
  15. I am no digital native and need help with these: ​​​​​​​​​​​​​​creating hyperlinks, tracking edits in Word, making edits in Pdf, sending large documents and folders via WeTransfer
  16. Visualise your communication for impact
  17. HSRC events: Requirements for drafting and sending invitations

This toolkit is designed to help HSRC researchers to communicate information about their research effectively to maximise impact.​​​​​​​

Impact Resources homepage