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St Salvators Quad, University of St Andrews
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Does a bibliography and/or footnotes count in a word count?

Hey guys,

Finishing up my first essay and just realised that I forgot to check whether footnotes or the bibliography count in word count...

Thanks in advance,

S...A...W...
I'm no expert on essays, but I would guess that you should count footmarks in the work count, and that the bibliography does not count towards the word count.

If anyone with more knowledge contradicts me, then trust them :smile:
St Salvators Quad, University of St Andrews
University of St Andrews
Reply 2
Avatar for HanLWms
HanLWms
No. You shouldn't count either in the word count! x
Reply 3
Avatar for joneal
joneal
11
shouldn't count either.
Reply 4
Avatar for Pawsies
Pawsies
15
I wouldn't think either would but don't count on me :p:
Reply 5
Avatar for Beanybob
Beanybob
7
I've been told for english and history that footnotes count, bibliography doesnt.
If I ever have footnotes, I do a word count WITH footnotes and a word count without.

Bibliography should never be included.
Reply 7
Avatar for Hylean
Hylean
15
At UCL, they technically both count, but unofficially neither do.
Some don't even count the title, let alone foot-notes and bibliographies. There's no particular hard and fast rule, although I've never heard of a bibliography being counted.
Reply 9
Avatar for pipsi
pipsi
It all depends on the specific rules for your course, they should be set out in your departmental handbook. My undergrad dept essays didn't include footnotes or bibliography, but I used to use the word count on Microsoft Word and it was a while before i realised that the built in word count includes footnotes unless you tell it not to but i think each footnote only classes as one word because it is counting the number in the text referring to the footnote not the footnote itself, so to get the correct number do a word count and take away the number of footnotes you have. Hopefully that made sense.
The School of Philosophy says
The word count for all coursework essays should include all footnotes, endnotes,
and quotes, but should not include the bibliography. Please include the word
count on the title page of your coursework.

But that's advice for postgrads, I think. I'm not sure, but if your footnotes are very small, I wouldn't worry about them knocking you slightly over the word count. If you need to state the word count, you could do it twice, including and excluding footnotes.

Edit: It looks similar for 5th year IR modules... and for 1st year divinity.

Edit (again): The geography department has a document discouraging people using footnotes to bulk out their word count, but everything else I have found suggests that footnotes count, bibliographies don't.
Thanks for all this guys. I'll provide two word counts - one with footnotes and one without.

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