Bibliographies
How to divide, order and format the bibliography at the end of your work.
Not every law assignment requires a bibliography, so the first step is to check your unit guide.
If a bibliography is required, it should include every source you relied on when preparing your work, not just the sources that appear in your footnotes.
Unlike footnotes, a bibliography appears at the end of your document and is organised into sections.
Bibliography sections
A bibliography isn’t one long alphabetical list.
Instead, it is divided into categories based on the type of source. A typical AGLC bibliography looks like this:
- A Articles/Books/Reports
- B Cases
- C Legislation
- D Treaties
- E Other
These headings aren’t fixed. If a section would be empty, you can leave it out. Likewise, if your research includes a large number of sources of one type, you can create additional headings or subdivisions where appropriate.
Within each section, entries are listed in alphabetical order.
How bibliography entries differ from footnotes
A bibliography entry is very similar to the corresponding footnote, but there are three important differences.
| Feature | Footnote | Bibliography |
|---|---|---|
| Author | David Forsythe | Forsythe, David |
| Pinpoint | ✓ Included | ✗ Removed |
| Full stop | ✓ Yes | ✗ No |
| Order | In citation order | Alphabetical |
1. The first author’s name is inverted
In a footnote, the author’s first name comes first. In a bibliography, the surname comes first.
Only the first author is inverted. Any additional authors remain in their normal order.
2. Remove pinpoint references
Bibliographies don’t include page numbers, paragraph numbers or other pinpoints.
The exception is journal articles, where the opening page forms part of the citation rather than being a pinpoint.
3. Don’t end the entry with a full stop
Unlike footnotes, bibliography entries do not finish with a full stop.
Alphabetical order
Within each section, entries are arranged alphabetically. Usually, this means ordering them by the surname of the first author.
If two entries have the same first author, AGLC orders them by:
- the first author’s given name;
- the names of any additional authors (a single-author work comes before co-authored works);
- the title of the work (ignoring the word The at the beginning of a title).
If the author is an organisation rather than an individual, alphabetise using the organisation’s name. If a source has no author, alphabetise it by its title.
Cases and legislation
Cases and legislation are listed alphabetically by case name or title of the legislation.
Unlike books and articles, nothing is inverted. They also appear without pinpoint references.
Pincite builds the bibliography line for every saved citation and files it under the correct section on export.
Quick checklist
Before submitting your bibliography, check that you have:
- included every source you relied on (if a bibliography is required);
- organised sources into the correct sections;
- alphabetised each section correctly;
- inverted the first author’s name;
- removed pinpoint references; and
- removed the full stop from the end of each entry.
Last reviewed 4 August 2026