MLA Citation Guide

Works Cited List

• Books
• Periodicals
• Online Databases
• Websites

In-Text Citations

• Paraphrasing
• Quotes

Works Cited List

Books

You must always include the information in bold; include the other information when indicated in the specific examples below.

1. Author(s)

2. Title of essay in book

3. Title of book

4. Editor

5. Edition

6. Name of the series

7. Number of volumes

8. Place, publisher*, and copyright date

9. Volume number of the book

10. Page numbers of essay in book

* Omit abbreviations (Inc., Ltd., etc.) and descriptive words (Books, House, Press, Publishers, etc.). If the publisher is a university press, write "UP" (Harvard UP).

Title your list "Works Cited" and list your sources alphabetically by author.

One Author

(Indent second and subsequent lines five spaces.)

Two Authors

(Indent second and subsequent lines five spaces.)

Three Authors

Defries, J. C., Jacquelyn J. Gillis, and Sally J. Wadsworth. "Genes and Genders: A Twin Study of Reading Disability." Dyslexia and Development: Neurobiological Aspects of Extra-Ordinary Brains. Ed. Albert M. Galaburda. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard UP, 1993. 187-204.

(Indent second and subsequent lines five spaces.)

Same Author, Different Works

Hallowell, Edward M., and John J. Ratey. Answers to Distraction. New York: Pantheon, 1994.

---. Driven to Distraction. New York: Pantheon, 1994.

(Indent second and subsequent lines five spaces.)

Edited Collection of Essays by Different Authors

Wilsher, C.R. "Unconventional Treatments for Dyslexia." Dyslexia Matters: A Celebratory Volume to Honour Professor T.R. Miles. Ed. Gerald Hales. San Diego, CA: Singular, 1994. 161-71.

(Indent second and subsequent lines five spaces.)

Cross-References

Duane and Wilsher each authored essays in a book edited by Hales:

Duane, Drake D. "Neurobiological Patterns in Dyslexia." Hales 30-39.

Hales, Gerald, ed. Dyslexia Matters: A Celebratory Volume to Honour Professor T.R. Miles. San Diego, CA: Singular, 1994.

Wilsher, C.R. "Unconventional Treatments for Dyslexia." Hales 161-71.

(Indent second and subsequent lines five spaces.)

Encyclopedia

"Desegregation." Encyclopedia of Social Issues. Ed. John Smith and Sara Jones. 6 vols. New York: Marshall Cavendish, 1997.

(Indent second and subsequent lines five spaces.)

Need an example not listed here?

Periodicals

1. Author(s)

2. Title of article

3. Name of periodical*

4. Volume, issue, year, and page numbers** (for journals)

or Complete date, year, and page numbers** (for magazines and newspapers)

* Omit the "The" or "A" when it begins a periodical title. (For example: write The New York Times as New York Times.)

** List the pages for the entire article. If the article skips pages (for example, there are pages with ads between the article pages), then list only the first page of the article, followed by a plus symbol.

You may wonder, "What's the difference between magazines and journals?"

Magazine Article, Monthly

(Indent second and subsequent lines five spaces.)

Magazine Article, Weekly

(Indent second and subsequent lines five spaces.)

Anonymous Author (Journal or Magazine)

(Indent second and subsequent lines five spaces.)

Journal Article, with All Issues for a Volume Paged Consecutively

Patterson, Karalyn, and Marlene Behrmann. "Frequency and Consistency Effects in a Pure Surface Dyslexic Patient." Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance 23 (1997): 1217-32.

(Indent second and subsequent lines five spaces.)

Journal Article, with Each Issue Paged Separately

Lippi-Green, Rosina. "What We Talk about When We Talk about Ebonics: Why Definitions Matter." Black Scholar 27.2 (1997): 7-12.

(Indent second and subsequent lines five spaces.)

Abstract of a Journal Article

(Indent second and subsequent lines five spaces.)

Newspaper Article

Browne, Malcom W. "If a Platypus Had a Dream, What Would It Mean?" New York Times 16 Dec. 1997: B11.

(Indent second and subsequent lines five spaces.)

Newspaper Article, Anonymous Author

(Indent second and subsequent lines five spaces.)

Need an example not listed here?

Online Databases

Journal, Magazine, or Newspaper Article from an Online Database

1. Database Company (e.g., Infotrac Web; FirstSearch, etc.)

2. Database Name (e.g., General Reference Center; Academic ASAP; PsychLit, etc.)

3. Document Number (e.g., document number 1EC053A; article A15965479).

Don't end with a periodÜpeople using the article/document number to find your article won't find it if they include a period.

Example:

(Indent second and subsequent lines five spaces.)

Why should you bother citing the database?

Suppose you want to quotethe above article on what children should learn. The citation shows that the article is covered in The Atlantic Monthly on pages 65 to 78, but the article you printed from SearchBank says pages 1 through 7. If you want to quote from page 5 of your printout, you can't know for sure whether that quote appeared on page 73 or 74 (or some other page) in the original article. Therefore, if you need to cite page 5 as the page you are quoting, you need to indicate that it's page 5 from the Infotrac Web General Reference Center article, and not page 5 of The Atlantic Monthly.

Abstract from an Online Database

1. Database Company (e.g., Infotrac SearchBank; FirstSearch, etc.)

2. Database Name (e.g., General Reference Center; SIRS Researcher; PsychLit, etc.)

3. Document Number (e.g., document number 1EC053A; article A15965479).

Don't end with a periodÜpeople using the article/document number to find your article won't find it if they include a period.

Example:

(Indent second and subsequent lines five spaces.)

World Wide Websites

1. Author or editor of website (if listed--check the top and the bottom of the web page)

2. Title of website

3. Date of last update (if listed--check the bottom of the web page)

4. Name of institution or organization sponsoring the website (if listed)

5. Date you accessed the website

6. URL (address) of the website

Examples:

Professional Sites
(sites by or for an organization, company, the government, or a college or university--look for the ".org", ".com", ".gov" or ".edu" in the URL/web address)

About Dyslexia. International Dyslexia Association. 1 May 1998 <http://www.interdys.org/about_dy.stm>.

Fact Sheet: Nuclear Power Plant Emergency. 27 Feb. 1997. Federal Emergency Management Agency. 1 May 1998 <http://www.fema.gov/home/fema/radiolo.htm>.

(Indent second and subsequent lines five spaces.)

Personal Sites
(sites by an individual who has created the sites for the general public--or at least for members of the general public with the same interests as him or her--and not on behalf of a company, organization, the government, or a college or university)

Priven, Michael. Daliweb: Biography and Artistic Style: The Surreal Years. 8 Feb. 1998. 1 May 1998 <http://members.xoom.com/daliweb>.

(Indent second and subsequent lines five spaces.)

In-Text Citations

When you paraphrase or quote a source:

Cite the page number(s) of the paraphrased information.

• Exceptions: don't include the page number if:
  
  • the source is only a page long
  
  • the source is a website
  
  • the source is an article from an online database
  
  • you wish to cite the entire source

Within a paragraph, the second (or third, etc.) time you site a source, list only the page number. No page number? Then you can write "(ibid.)"

Use the present tense to explain what an author wrote.

If your quote contains a quote, use single quotation marks (' ') around the original quote.

One Author

Smith agrees with this assertion (33).

or

This point has been argued before (Smith 33).

Two Authors

Others argue an opposite point of view (e.g., Wellek and Warren, 314-15).

Same Author, Different Works

In Driven to Distraction, Hallowell and Ratey explain . . . (24).

or

. . . may be one solution (Hallowell and Ratey Answers to Distraction 48).

Anonymous Author

Because Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) reveals differences in brain activity between dyslexics and non-dyslexics, it may someday be used to diagnose dyslexia ("Tracking Down").

The above sentence is a paraphrase of the Newsweek article, "Tracking Down the Roots of Dyslexia" and is listed as an example of an "Anonymous Author (Magazine or Journal)" on page 3 of this guide. The reason no page number is listed in the in-text citation is because the article is only one page long, and therefore there's no need to distinguish between page numbers.

Article from an Online Database

Gagnon argues that the lack of a national educational standards is largely responsible for the poor performance of American students.

American schools need national educational standards in order to improve the quality of education they offer (Gagnon).

Website

The Federal Emergency Management Agency provides the online "Fact Sheet: Nuclear Power Plant Emergency" to inform the public about nuclear power plant emergencies and how to respond to them.

In a nuclear power plant emergency, any school children with a 10-mile radius of a power plant would be evacuated before the general public (Federal Emergency Management Agency).

Good news: after you've spelled out the lengthy name of an organization such as the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the next time you need to cite it, you can use their abbreviated name, such as in this case, "FEMA".

Quotation

Many people find definitions of LD to be confusing. Balter admits that "there is no easy definition, free of jargon, that just 'tells it like it is'" (41).

When your quote is longer than four lines:

• Start the quote on a new line.

• Indent the entire quote by ten spaces (two tabs).

• Don't use quotation marks.

• Double-space the entire quote (just like the rest of the paper).

• If your quote contains a quote, use double quotation marks (" ") around the original quote.

Example:

obligations can help people with ADD focus on what they need

to accomplish:

Choosing the right set of goals and then making

them obligations is crucial. An obligation can

mobilize "good guilt" that will help you make the

goal that you set with your coach or team. This

"good guilt" focuses you, and because it functions

as a demand for action, it lets you escape from the

trap of procrastination. (219)

Need an example not listed here?