# University of Pretoria referencing: UP Harvard and APA 7

**Which referencing style does the University of Pretoria use?** The University of Pretoria has no single referencing style. The UP Library's Assignment Writing guide calls APA 7 the most widely used style at UP, required in Humanities, Education, Economic and Management Sciences and Natural and Agricultural Sciences. Several faculties and departments publish their own Harvard versions, Health Sciences uses Vancouver, and Law cites in footnotes. Your lecturer decides.

Published 2026-10-02 by EdCitation. https://edcitation.com/newsletter/referencing-at-the-university-of-pretoria

The University of Pretoria (UP, or Tuks) has no single referencing style. The UP Library's [referencing guide](https://library.up.ac.za/referencing) tells students to ask their lecturer which style "and variation thereof" to use, then links seven faculty-approved guides. Its Assignment Writing guide calls APA 7 the most widely used style at UP, and Harvard at UP is several styles, not one.

Every rule below, for anyone searching "TUKS referencing" or "UP Harvard referencing", was read on 2 October 2026 in UP's library pages and the guides they link. EdCitation is not affiliated with the University of Pretoria; this follows its public library guide, checked on 2 October 2026. For the national picture, see [referencing at South African universities](https://edcitation.com/newsletter/referencing-at-south-african-universities).

EdCitation publishes this guide. Near the end, UP's own examples go through the free [Cite a source](https://edcitation.com/cite) and [Verify references](https://edcitation.com/verify-references), faults included.

## Which referencing style does the University of Pretoria use?

The one your module outline or lecturer names: the Assignment Writing guide says to use the brief's style and ask the lecturer when none is given (University of Pretoria Library, 2026a). UP's pages assign styles like this:

| Faculty or department | Style UP's pages name | UP page |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Humanities, Education, Economic and Management Sciences, Natural and Agricultural Sciences | APA 7, "the most widely used style at UP" | Assignment Writing, UP Library (2026a) |
| Economic and Management Sciences (referencing page) | Harvard (UP EMS), Business Management's 81-page guide | Kotzé (2022) |
| Education | Abridged Harvard; APA for Educational Psychology | Education Library, UP Library (2024) |
| Health Sciences | Vancouver; Harvard in Nursing Science and Physiotherapy | UP Library (2025b) |
| School of Public Management and Administration | SPMA Harvard | SPMA (2024) |
| Theology and Religion | Harvard (Theology) | Janse van Rensburg (2019) |
| Veterinary Science | Harvard, preferred by "most departments" | UP Library (2026d) |
| Engineering, computer science, IT | IEEE | UP Library (2026a) |
| Law | PULP style (Law library); OSCOLA (Assignment Writing guide) | Pretoria University Law Press (2025) |

### Where UP's own pages disagree

Three faculties get two answers. For Education, the referencing page lists Harvard, the Assignment Writing guide requires APA 7, and the Education Library's Harvard sheet sends only Educational Psychology to APA. For Economic and Management Sciences, the Assignment Writing guide says APA 7; the referencing page links the Business Management Harvard. For Law, that page's link opens the same Business Management guide, the Law library links the Pretoria University Law Press (PULP) style, and the Assignment Writing guide names OSCOLA. Your module outline settles it.

## What are the University of Pretoria's APA 7 rules?

UP's APA 7 page follows the APA manual with no house changes we could find (University of Pretoria Library, 2026a). Its rules:

- *Et al.* from the first citation for three or more authors, (Sithole et al., 2022); & inside brackets.
- A quotation carries its page, (Molefe, 2023, p. 42); a source met in another is cited "as cited in".
- The list is headed References, centred and bold, with hanging indents, double spaced "in formal submissions", unnumbered unless the faculty asks, and up to 20 authors an entry.
- Sentence case for article and book titles; journal names in title case and italics, the volume italic, and a DOI where there is one.
- A retrieval date for a web page only if its content is likely to change.
- An AI tool only when the lecturer allows it, and any fact it gives still needs a published source.

The page's journal example carries a placeholder DOI, 10.xxxx: copy its patterns, not its details. See also [APA 7 in-text citations](https://edcitation.com/newsletter/apa-7-in-text-citations).

## What does a UP APA 7 reference list look like?

Four real sources, set as UP's APA page asks. In the text:

> South African primary schooling divides along lines of poverty and privilege (Spaull, 2013). The National Curriculum Statement Grades R-12 sets out the knowledge, skills and values learners should acquire (Department of Basic Education, n.d.). Mthabini et al. (2020) examine reverse logistics as a route to public value in the South African Police Service, and Rowley (2012) gives practical guidance on research interviews.

Under References:

> Department of Basic Education. (n.d.). *National curriculum statements (NCS) grades R-12*. https://www.education.gov.za/Curriculum/NationalCurriculumStatementsGradesR-12.aspx
>
> Mthabini, E., Mazenda, A., & Masiya, T. (2020). Promoting public value by implementing reverse logistics in the South African Police Service. *Journal of Transport and Supply Chain Management*, *14*, Article a524. https://doi.org/10.4102/jtscm.v14i0.524
>
> Rowley, J. (2012). Conducting research interviews. *Management Research Review*, *35*(3/4), 260–271. https://doi.org/10.1108/01409171211210154
>
> Spaull, N. (2013). Poverty & privilege: Primary school inequality in South Africa. *International Journal of Educational Development*, *33*(5), 436–447. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijedudev.2012.09.009

The department is both author and site, so no site name follows. The page shows no date of its own (the footer's copyright year is the site's), so n.d., and a stable curriculum page needs no retrieval date. "South Africa", "NCS" and "R" keep their capitals in sentence case.

## What is UP Harvard referencing?

UP Harvard is whichever Harvard your department publishes. The library's EndNote page offers ten Harvard output styles, from Harvard (General) to Harvard (Chem_Eng) (University of Pretoria Library, 2026b). The most detailed written version is *Referencing in academic documents*, the Department of Business Management's 10th edition of 2022, whose EndNote style is Harvard (UP EMS) (Kotzé, 2022).

### Harvard (UP EMS), rule by rule

| Rule | Harvard (UP EMS) form | Kotzé (2022) page |
| --- | --- | --- |
| In the text | (Cook, 2021:44) or Cook (2021:44): a comma before the year, no space at the colon | 8, 12 |
| Page numbers | In every citation when the source has them; a whole article as 12-34 | 12 |
| Three or more authors | Every surname at the first citation, then *et al.* in italics: (Saunders et al., 2016:12) | 11 |
| "and" or & | "and" in your sentence; & in brackets and in the list, with no comma before it | 11, 76 |
| Organisation as author | At the end of the sentence, (Statistics South Africa, 2007:23), never "According to Statistics South Africa" | 9 |
| Journal article | Rowley, J. 2012. Conducting research interviews. *Management Research Review*, 35(3/4):260-271. | 22, 31 |
| PDF with page numbers | Cited as a printed article: no URL and no DOI | 31 |
| Book | Edition from the second; place with the US state: 2nd ed. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley. | 25 |
| Online source | [Online] Available from: URL [Accessed: 2021-10-04], the date as YYYY-MM-DD | 21 |
| Undated web page | "Not dated" for the year; title in sentence case and italics | 55 |
| The list | LIST OF REFERENCES as a numbered, bold heading, never "Bibliography"; no hanging indent; justified; a blank line between entries; 1.5 spacing; Arial 12 | 20-21, 76 |

The guide disagrees with itself once: its cheat sheet dates an undated web page "n.d." (p. 75), where section 8.15 asks for "Not dated". It also calls references copied from Google Scholar "often incorrect and incomplete" (p. 32).

### The other UP Harvards

| Variant | In the text | *Et al.* | Online sources |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Education Library, abridged Harvard (2024) | (Kersey & Masterson 2017:434), no comma | From three authors: (Grové et al. 2015:694) | [Online] Available from: URL [Accessed 16 February 2020]. |
| SPMA (2024) | (Mazenda & Masiya 2020:58) | From three authors | Available at: URL (Accessed on 25 June 2012). |
| Theology and Religion (2019) | (Doss 2003:256) | Three names first, then *et al.* | viewed 28 September 2005, from URL |
| Health Sciences, Nursing Science and Physiotherapy (December 2012) | (Fischer 2011:96) | Every name first, even six; then "De Jager, et al" | Vancouver's [updated …; cited …]. Available from: URL |

Theology also puts the publisher before the place and article titles in single quotation marks (Janse van Rensburg, 2019). The Health Sciences Harvard drops italics from book and journal titles and lists six authors, then et al. (University of Pretoria Library, 2025a). Veterinary Science links a journal publisher's Harvard guide. The GIBS, Humanities, Social Work and Criminology and Chemical Engineering styles are EndNote files only, so we could not read their rules. For Cite Them Right Harvard, see our [Harvard referencing guide](https://edcitation.com/newsletter/harvard-referencing-guide).

## Which EdCitation style is closest, and what do you change by hand?

APA 7 for UP's APA, Harvard for every UP Harvard, and Vancouver for Health Sciences. EdCitation builds six styles only, APA 7, MLA 9, Chicago 18 author-date, Harvard (Cite Them Right), IEEE and Vancouver, so PULP, OSCOLA and the Royal Society of Chemistry style on UP's EndNote page are written by hand.

| UP asks for | Start in EdCitation's | Then change by hand |
| --- | --- | --- |
| APA 7 | [APA 7](https://edcitation.com/cite/apa) | Add an article number the record lacks; delete "Retrieved … from" unless the page changes; enter a web page's author in the form |
| Harvard (UP EMS) | [Harvard](https://edcitation.com/cite/harvard) | Year unbracketed, then a full stop; article titles in sentence case without quotation marks; ":260-271" for the pages; "&" before the last author; no DOI for a PDF with pages; "[Online] Available from: … [Accessed: 2026-10-02]." for web pages |
| Education, SPMA, Theology, Health Sciences Harvard | [Harvard](https://edcitation.com/cite/harvard) | As for UP EMS, but no comma before the year in the text, and each variant's own online form from the table above |
| Vancouver (Health Sciences) | [Vancouver](https://edcitation.com/cite/vancouver) | Superscript numbers for "(1)"; abbreviate any journal name printed in full |
| IEEE (engineering, computer science, IT) | [IEEE](https://edcitation.com/cite/ieee) | UP publishes no IEEE guide we found; follow the department's example |
| PULP or OSCOLA (Law) | Not built | Footnotes by hand, in the style your module names |

## What did Cite a source and Verify references return on UP's examples?

[Cite a source](https://edcitation.com/cite) is the best first step for a UP list because every entry starts from the publisher's record, never from composition; that record exposed the slips in UP's examples below. From a DOI, title, PubMed ID, ISBN or web address it builds the entry in six styles and screens the source for retraction, free and with no account. EdCitation never writes any part of your assignment: it hands you the record behind each reference, and the reading, the argument and every sentence stay yours.

### Cite a source on four sources

For DOI 10.1108/01409171211210154, the Rowley article Kotzé (2022) converts from Google Scholar, Harvard returned:

> Rowley, J. (2012) ‘Conducting research interviews’, Management Research Review, 35(3/4), pp. 260–271. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1108/01409171211210154.

Take the year out of brackets and add a full stop, drop the quotation marks, change ", pp. 260–271" to ":260-271" and delete "Available at:" and the DOI: that is Kotzé's example. APA returned our worked example's Rowley and Spaull entries word for word.

For 10.1007/s10551-013-1769-0, the Education Library's Brown and Treviño example, Harvard kept the record's capitals, "‘Do Role Models Matter? An Investigation of Role Modeling as an Antecedent of Perceived Ethical Leadership’"; lower them for any UP Harvard. The record spells Treviño, UP's example Trevino.

For 10.4102/jtscm.v14i0.524, the SPMA's Mthabini example, APA ended "*Journal of Transport and Supply Chain Management*, *14*. https://doi.org/…": no style carried the article number, a524, shown on the journal's page.

For the Department of Basic Education page, the details read from the page gave no author and lowered the R of Grade R: "National curriculum statements grade r - 12. (n.d.). Retrieved October 2, 2026, from …". With the department and the page's heading entered in the form, APA gave our worked example's entry plus "Retrieved October 2, 2026, from". For UP EMS, Harvard's version becomes:

> Department of Basic Education. Not dated. *National curriculum statements (NCS) grades R-12*. [Online] Available from: https://www.education.gov.za/Curriculum/NationalCurriculumStatementsGradesR-12.aspx [Accessed: 2026-10-02].

Statistics South Africa's release page, the SPMA's example, came back "That page could not be read. Some sites block automated readers." Write it from Kotzé's pattern (p. 45).

### Verify references on eight entries

We pasted eight entries into [Verify references](https://edcitation.com/verify-references): six exactly as UP's guides print them and two from our worked example. All eight came back verified, none retracted:

- Kotzé's Rowley and Ehrhart, the Education Library's Brown, the SPMA's Mthabini and the Vancouver guide's Halpern: "Title, year and first author match a published record."
- The Education Library's Ramalho, with "doi:" inside "Available from:", and our Spaull: "The DOI resolves to this record and the title matches."
- The Department of Basic Education page: "The page is at this address, and its title matches."

Verified means the source exists, not that every detail is right: the SPMA example writes "reverse logistic" where the record has "reverse logistics", and 14(1) where the journal's page shows volume 14, article a524 and no issue. Copy UP's patterns; take each detail from the record.

## How do you build a UP reference list, step by step?

1. Find the style in your module outline; EdCitation's free [Check your paper](https://edcitation.com/check) reads an assignment's instructions into a checklist, citation style included.
2. Open your faculty's guide from the first table.
3. Build each entry in [Cite a source](https://edcitation.com/cite) from its DOI, title, PubMed ID or address, correcting a web page's details in the form first.
4. Make the changes in the table above.
5. Run the list through [Verify references](https://edcitation.com/verify-references) and open the source behind any "check this" or "could not check".
6. Match citations to the list both ways, a check Kotzé (2022) says examiners make. With Pro ($8 a month), [References from a file](https://edcitation.com/tools/references-from-a-file) does it from the uploaded paper; see [pricing](https://edcitation.com/pricing).

## Quick questions

### What referencing style does the University of Pretoria use?

The one your module outline names. The UP Library calls APA 7 the most widely used; several departments publish Harvard versions, and Health Sciences uses Vancouver.

### Is UP Harvard the same as Cite Them Right Harvard?

No. UP's Harvards print the year without brackets, put a colon before the page, (Cook, 2021:44), and drop the quotation marks round most article titles. Start in EdCitation's [Harvard](https://edcitation.com/cite/harvard) and convert by hand.

### When does et al. start in UP Harvard?

In Harvard (UP EMS), at three authors, after every surname has been given once. The Education Library's and SPMA's examples use et al. for three or more authors with no full first mention.

### Does EdCitation build OSCOLA or PULP references for UP Law?

No. EdCitation's [Cite a source](https://edcitation.com/cite) builds APA 7, MLA 9, Chicago 18 author-date, Harvard, IEEE and Vancouver; law footnotes are written by hand.

### Does EdCitation write any part of my UP assignment?

No. EdCitation finds sources, builds each reference from its record and checks your list; every argument and sentence you hand in is your own.

## References

- Janse van Rensburg, H. (2019). *Harvard referencing guide* [PDF]. Faculty of Theology and Religion, University of Pretoria. [https://library.up.ac.za/ld.php?content_id=64865239](https://library.up.ac.za/ld.php?content_id=64865239)
- Kotzé, T. (2022). *Referencing in academic documents: Official referencing guidelines of the Department of Business Management* (10th ed.) [PDF]. University of Pretoria. [https://library.up.ac.za/ld.php?content_id=29924236](https://library.up.ac.za/ld.php?content_id=29924236)
- Pretoria University Law Press. (2025). *Publication style guidelines 2025* [PDF]. [https://www.pulp.up.ac.za/images/pulp/publish/PULP%20Styleguidelines%202025.pdf](https://www.pulp.up.ac.za/images/pulp/publish/PULP%20Styleguidelines%202025.pdf)
- University of Pretoria Library. (2024). *Quick guide to referencing techniques (abridged Harvard method)* [PDF]. Education Library. [https://library.up.ac.za/ld.php?content_id=50491836](https://library.up.ac.za/ld.php?content_id=50491836)
- University of Pretoria Library. (2025a). *Harvard referencing style: Quick guide*. Faculty Libraries for Health Sciences. [https://library.up.ac.za/health/harvardmed](https://library.up.ac.za/health/harvardmed)
- University of Pretoria Library. (2025b). *Referencing and citing for health sciences*. Faculty Libraries for Health Sciences. [https://library.up.ac.za/health/journals](https://library.up.ac.za/health/journals)
- University of Pretoria Library. (2025c). *Vancouver referencing style: Quick guide*. Faculty Libraries for Health Sciences. [https://library.up.ac.za/health/vancouver](https://library.up.ac.za/health/vancouver)
- University of Pretoria Library. (2026a). *Assignment writing: Referencing*. [https://library.up.ac.za/c.php?g=1525232&p=11423429](https://library.up.ac.za/c.php?g=1525232&p=11423429)
- University of Pretoria Library. (2026b). *EndNote: Referencing styles*. [https://library.up.ac.za/c.php?g=709989&p=5045818](https://library.up.ac.za/c.php?g=709989&p=5045818)
- University of Pretoria Library. (2026c). *Referencing*. [https://library.up.ac.za/referencing](https://library.up.ac.za/referencing)
- University of Pretoria Library. (2026d). *Veterinary science: Referencing*. [https://library.up.ac.za/c.php?g=426995&p=3275022](https://library.up.ac.za/c.php?g=426995&p=3275022)
- University of Pretoria School of Public Management and Administration. (2024). *SPMA referencing guide* [PDF]. [https://library.up.ac.za/ld.php?content_id=77655511](https://library.up.ac.za/ld.php?content_id=77655511)