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Referencing question

Hi everyone,

First of all to admins please feel free to move this thread to wherever you deem appropriate - I couldn't see an obvious section in which to post this as it doesn't apply to any discipline in particular. Sorry.

I need to reference a page in a book that appears before the proper page numbering begins. It's one of those pages used for the copyright information or dedication that in this case features a legal disclaimer. I considered mentioning this in the text as:

"...inclusion of a legal disclaimer in the opening pages of XXX (Someone, 2007)"

However, this doesn't seem like a good enough solution as it could be perceived as me just being vague and not indicating which page it can actually be found on.

Any thoughts? Can't find any advice on this with a google search.

Thanks in advance!

Reply 1

loadunit

Bit disappointed that days later the only response has been a completely irrelevant ad for another site.

Does nobody know how to do this? Is there no convention?

Reply 2

uthred50

Hiya,

Sorry to see you've had a delay in getting a reply.

Assuming you're using standard 'Harvard' referencing,

Those pages before a book starts in earnest are usually numbered with Roman numerals (i, ii, iii, iv, etc). If they're not, it's acceptable to count from the first page (first page not generally including publishing info or title page) to the page you're on, and express it as a numeral in referencing. However, most people would probably just put (Bloggs, 2013: preface) or words to that effect.

Uth

Reply 3

loadunit

uthred, thanks so much that's exactly what I was after!

Was surprised not to find this information elsewhere but could not find it anywhere - you're a star <3