MLA Works-Cited Formatting

1. MLA Works-Cited Formatting A Primer for English 100

2. What is the MLA? • MLA stands for the Modern Language Association • It was founded in 1883 and “provides opportunities for its members to share their scholarly findings and teaching experiences with colleagues….” (MLA.org) • It has more than 30,000 members in 100 countries

3. What is the MLA? • The MLA publishes 12 books a year (with a backlist of 200 books) and four periodicals • ADE Bulletin • ADFL Bulletin • Profession • PMLA

4. What is the MLA? • MLA is a style of documentation used in the humanities, in particular writing and literature. • There are two major handbooks • We only need to worry about one of them, The MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers. • If you are curious, the other is The MLA Style Manual and Guide to Scholarly Publishing. It’s for graduate students, scholars and professional writers.

5. What is the point of MLA? • So why are we learning this? What does it do? • When you do a research paper, you need to let your instructor know what sources you used. • MLA has established a method you use to document your sources.

6. What is the point of MLA? • So why are we learning this? What does it do? • When you do a research paper, you need to let your instructor know what sources you used. • MLA has established a method for you to document your sources.

7. What is the point of MLA? • Why do I have to document my sources? • When you do a research paper, you need to cite every piece of information you find so your instructor knows which information comes from you, and which information is from another source.

8. What is the point of MLA? • Not using MLA (or in other classes, APA) if you have used a source for information makes you liable for plagiarism. • So what is plagiarism? • Plagiarism is passing off someone else’s work as your own, and it is a very serious academic offense.

9. What is the point of MLA? • Using the MLA style of documentation protects you from accusations of plagiarism, and is good scholarship besides.

10. MLA Documentation • There are two ways to document your sources, and both must be done to make your paper MLA-compliant. • This powerpoint will cover both of them: Intext citations (otherwise known as parenthetical citations), and a Works Cited page.

11. MLA Citations • The two citations work in tandem: the citation in the text alerts the reader that you used a source. The reader can find more information about that source in the Works Cited page. • Again, to be MLA-compliant, you need BOTH citations!

12. In-Text Citations • Also known as parenthetical citations. • This method requires you to place basic information regarding your source (in parenthesis) immediately after you use it.

13. Citing Sources in the Text • If you used a book, this is simple. For the first reference, you use the name of the author and the page number. For example: Romantic poetry is characterized by the "spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings" (Wordsworth 263)

14. Citing Sources in Text-Print • If you use the same source twice in a row, you only have to refer to the author’s name once. For example: Romantic poetry is characterized by the "spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings" (Wordsworth 263). Wordsworth extensively explored the role of emotion in the creative process (263).

15. Citing Sources in Text-Print • The same rules apply if you used a journal or magazine article on the subject. • If you have a print source that has no author, use a shortened version of the title and put it in quotes. Longer versions of the quote should go in italics.

16. Citing Sources in Text-Print • Example of a shorter title: We see so many global warming hotspots in North America likely because this region has “more readily accessible climatic data and more comprehensive programs to monitor and study environmental change.” (“Impact of Global Warming” 6).

17. Citing Sources in Text-Print • If you have a source that has multiple editions, include additional information for clarification, using either a volume number, part, chapter, section or paragraph. For example: Marx and Engels described human history as marked by class struggles (79; ch. 1). • This will help the person reading your paper if they have the same text but a different version.

18. Citing Sources in Text-Print • If you have two sources with the same last name, distinguish them by using their first initial in the citation. If even the initials are the same, use the full name. Although some medical ethicists claim that cloning will lead to designer children (R. Miller 12), others note that the advantages for medical research outweigh this consideration (A. Miller 46).

19. Citing Sources in Text-Print • If you have a work with three authors or fewer, use each of their last names and the page number. The authors state "Tighter gun control in the United States erode Second Amendment rights" (Smith, Yang, and Moore 76).

20. Citing Sources in Text-Print • If you have a source with four or more authors, either list all of the last names, or use the term et al. Et al. is a Latin term meaning “and the rest.” Use the author listed first. Legal experts counter Smith, Yang, and Moore's argument by noting that the current spike in gun violence in America compels law makers to adjust gun laws (Jones et al. 4).

21. Citing Sources in Text-Print • If you use several books written by the same author, use a shortened version of the title with quotations, as well as the page number. Lightenor has argued that computers are not useful tools for small children ("Too Soon" 38), though he has acknowledged elsewhere that early exposure to computer games does lead to better small motor skill development in a child's second and third year ("Hand-Eye Development" 17).

22. Citing Sources in Text-Print • If you use a source that has several different volumes, and you cite more than one of those volumes, you need to distinguish which volume you used. For example: . . . as Quintilian wrote in Institutio Oratoria (1: 14-17). The 1 is the volume number; the 14-17 are the page numbers. • If you use only one of the volumes, cite as normal with the author and page number.

23. Citing Sources in Text-Print • If you are quoting someone referred to in another work (also known as using an indirect source), use the term qtd. by. For example: Ravitch argues that high schools are pressured to act as "social service centers, and they don't do that well" (qtd. in Weisman 259).

24. Citing Sources in Text-Electronic • Electronic sources are handled differently than print sources, because often no authors are posted, and no page numbers are indicated. • Electronic sources include not just websites (though these are now the most common), but film (such as movies and TV shows), and radio interviews.

25. Citing Sources in Text-Electronic • When you cite an electronic source, include inside the parentheses the first item you use in your Works Cited entry. This will be either the author’s name, or if you don’t have an author, the article name. If you don’t have an article name, then the name of the website. • If using just the website name, you don’t need to full URL, just list the name of the website. For example, CNN.com, as opposed to http://www.cnn.com.

26. Works Cited Page-Basic Formatting • The Works Cited page should always be a separate printed page. Use the words Works Cited (you don’t need quotes), and center it at the top of the page. • Double space the citations, but don’t put spaces in between each citation.

27. Works Cited Page-Basic Formatting • Indent the second line of the citation by five spaces, creating a “hanging” indent. • Put your sources in alphabetical order. • Don’t put numbers in front of the sources.

28. Works Cited Page-Basic Formatting • If you obtained a print source (such as a Time magazine article) via an online database (such as those offered by DCCC), include the name of database in your citation. List the database name in italics.

29. Works Cited Page-Basic Formatting • You are no longer required to list the full URL! However, I still want to see it. So include these in angle brackets <>, with a period on the end.

30. Works Cited Page-Basic Formatting • You are now required to list the medium of the source. This will include Print, Web, Film, DVD, CD. These are listed at the very end of the citation.

31. Works Cited-Books • In the next several slides, we’re going to go over how to cite books. We can’t go through every permutation (or we’ll never get home tonight!), but we will go over the ones I think you are most likely to face.

32. Works Cited-Books • When using books as a source, you need to include the following items: the author name, the book title, the publication date, the publisher, the place of publication. This information can be found on the publisher’s page at the front of your book.

33. Works Cited-Books • Follow this basic format • Author’s name, using the last name first (for example, Smith, Betty). • The title of the book in italics. For example, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. • Place of publication, followed by a colon (:); the publisher, followed by a comma (,); and the year of publication, followed by a period. For example: New York: Harper & Row, 1947. • The medium of the source. For example: Print. This goes at the very end.

34. Works Cited-Books • The entire citation would be as follows: Smith, Betty. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. New York: Harper & Row, 1947. Print.

35. Works Cited-Books • If you have more than one author, you place the first listed author first (last name followed by first name), then the name of the second author (first and last name). Then cite as normal. • For example: Gillespie, Paula, and Neal Lerner. The Allyn and Bacon Guide to Peer Tutoring. Boston: Allyn, 2000. Print.

36. Works Cited-Books • If you use two books by the same author, you don’t have to list the author name twice. List the books in alphabetical order, and use three hyphens in place of the author name in the second instance of the citation.

37. Works Cited-Books • For example: Palmer, William J. Dickens and New Historicism. New York: St. Martin's, 1997. Print. ---. The Films of the Eighties: A Social History. Carbondale: Southern Illinois UP, 1993. Print.

38. Works Cited-Books • If your book doesn’t have an author, then skip the author and go right to the title of the book. For example Encyclopedia of Indiana. New York: Somerset, 1993. Print.

39. Works Cited-Books • If your book was originally written in a foreign language and was translated, you need to put both the author’s name and the translator’s name in your citation. The translator’s name goes after the title of the book.

40. Works Cited-Books • For example: Foucault, Michel. Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason. Trans. Richard Howard. New York: Vintage-Random House, 1988. Print. • For books that have been republished, you need to include the year it was published and the year it was reprinted. Butler, Judith. Gender Trouble. 1990. New York: Routledge, 1999. Print.

41. Works Cited-Books • If your book has more than one edition, place the edition number after the book title. Crowley, Sharon, and Debra Hawhee. Ancient Rhetorics for Contemporary Students. 3rd ed. New York: Pearson/ Longman, 2004. Print. • If your book was prepared by an editor, the editor’s name should follow the book title: Bronte, Charlotte. Jane Eyre. Ed. Margaret Smith. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1998. Print.

42. Works Cited-Books • If you use an entire anthology as a source, cite as you would any book that has an editor. Hill, Charles A., and Marguerite Helmers, eds. Defining Visual Rhetorics. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2004. Print.

43. Works Cited-Books • If you used an essay in the anthology, cite the author name, essay title, name of the anthology, the editor’s name, the place, publisher, year, and page number(s). For example: Swanson, Gunnar. "Graphic Design Education as a Liberal Art: Design and Knowledge in the University and The 'Real World.'" The Education of a Graphic Designer. Ed. Steven Heller. New York: Allworth Press, 1998. 13-24. Print.

44. Works Cited-Books • If you use an article in a reference book, such as an encyclopedia or a dictionary, cite as normal, but do not include the publisher information. “Ideology.” The American Heritage Dictionary. 3rd ed. 1997. Print. • If you use one volume of a multi-volume work, include the volume number after the title, or after the work’s editor or translator. Quintilian. Institutio Oratoria. Trans. H. E. Butler. Vol. 2. Cambridge: Loeb-Harvard UP, 1980. Print.

45. Works Cited-Web • Some basics… • URLs are no longer required by MLA, but could still be required by instructors. Place the URL in brackets <> at the end of the citation. • Aristotle. Poetics. Trans. S. H. Butcher. The Internet Classics Archive. Web Atomic and Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 13 Sept. 2007. Web. 4 Nov. 2008. <http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/ poetics.html>.

46. Works Cited-Web • More basics • Abbreviations have been introduced for further clarity. • N.P.-indicates that there’s no sponsor or publisher information • N.D.-indicates that there’s no date on the page • N. Pag.-indicates that there is no page number on the site or page

47. Works Cited-Web • When using a website for research, make a note of each of the following: • Author and editor names • Article name in quotes • Title of the website (or the project or publication on the website) in italics. • Any version information (revisions, posting dates, volumes or issue numbers) • Page numbers (if available) • Date you accessed the material • URL

48. Works Cited-Web • Citing an entire web site • Editor, author or compiler name first, if they are available • Then the name of the site in italics. • Version number, if available • Name of institution or organization with which the site is affiliated • The date the resource was created, if available • Medium of the publication • Date of access

49. Works Cited-Web • Citing an entire website • For example The Purdue OWL Family of Sites. The Writing Lab and OWL at Purdue and Purdue U, 2008. Web. 23 April 2008.Felluga, Dino. Guide to Literary and Critical Theory. Purdue U, 28 Nov. 2003. Web. 10 May 2006.

50. Works Cited-Web • For citing a course or department website • List the instructor name, the title of the course (or the school catalog number) in italics, the department and school names, followed by the course title. Use n.d. if the published date is not known. Felluga, Dino. Survey of the Literature of England. Purdue U, Aug. 2006. Web. 31 May 2007. English Department. Purdue U, 14 May 2009. Web. 20 Apr. 2009.