Citation Rules

Modern Language Association: Citations Rule

MLA provides a guide of how to present an academic paper, and how to cite appropriately.

Paper Layout:

·         The paper should have 1” margin in the four sides.

·         The font should be a readable one, so it is advisable to use Times New Roman; size 11 or 12.

·         The paper should be double spaced.

·         It should have a header, placed on the right margin. And it should contain the last name of the author and the page number.

·         The first page should contain: the name of the writer, the teacher’s name, the course information, the date, and the title of the paper. The latter should be centred and should have capitalized every letter expect for articles, coordination conjunctions and prepositions.

·         In the body, all paragraphs should be indented half inch to the right.

·         In the last page, should have the title “Works Cited” centred, and then all the citations. All the lines after the first one must be intended half inch to the right.

Citing a Book:

The basic format for citation a book is:

Last name, First name. Title of Book. City of Publication: Publisher, Year of Publication. Medium of Publication.

For example:

Henley, Patricia. The Hummingbird House. Denver: MacMurray, 1999. Print.

When a book has more than one author, we should put the last name followed by the first name of the first author; and the rest of the authors are written first by their first name, and then followed by the last name.

For example:

Gillespie, Paula, and Neal Lerner. The Allyn and Bacon Guide to Peer Tutoring. Boston: Allyn, 2000. Print.

However, when there are more than three authors, we can either list all the authors’ names or just list the first author followed by the phrase ’et al.’, which means in Latin “and others”. So the two options would be:

Wysocki, Anne Frances, et al. Writing New Media: Theory and Applications for Expanding the Teaching of Composition. Logan: Utah State UP, 2004. Print.

Wysocki, Anne Frances, Johndan Johnson-Eilola, Cynthia L. Selfe, and Geoffrey Sirc. Writing New Media: Theory and Applications for Expanding the Teaching of Composition. Logan: Utah State UP, 2004. Print.

When we cite more than one book by the same author, we list the books alphabetically by the title. For the first entry we provide the author’s last name followed by the first name, however, for the rest of the entries, we use three hyphens and a period instead f the author’s name.  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.

Sometimes, we may encounter a book with no author. In this case, we list these entries alphabetically by the title of the book. For instance:

Encyclopedia of Indiana. New York: Somerset, 1993. Print.

If we want to cite a poem or story the basic format of citation is:

Last name, First name. "Title of Poem." Title of Collection. Ed. Editor's Name(s). City of Publication: Publisher, Year. Page range of entry. Medium of Publication.

For example:

Burns, Robert. "Red, Red Rose." 100 Best-Loved Poems. Ed. Philip Smith. New York: Dover, 1995. 26. Print.

Citing Periodicals (magazines, newspapers, and scholarly journals):

The basic format for citing a magazine article is:

Author(s). "Title of Article." Title of Periodical Day Month Year: pages. Medium of publication.

The month should be abbreviated. An example would be:

Poniewozik, James. "TV Makes a Too-Close Call." Time 20 Nov. 2000: 70-71. Print.

The basic format for citing a newspaper article is very similar to the one of a magazine. The only difference is that we should indicate which edition is taken from (early or late edition). In this case, the identification of the edition should be after the date. For example:

Brubaker, Bill. "New Health Center Targets County's Uninsured Patients." Washington Post 24 May 2007: LZ01. Print.

Krugman, Andrew. "Fear of Eating." New York Times 21 May 2007 late ed.: A1. Print.

Another thing we should bear in mind when we cite an article of a newspaper is that if the newspaper is a less well-known or local publication, we should include the city name and state between brackets after the title of the newspaper.

Behre, Robert. "Presidential Hopefuls Get Final Crack at Core of S.C. Democrats." Post and Courier [Charleston, SC] 29 Apr. 2007: A11. Print.

Trembacki, Paul. "Brees Hopes to Win Heisman for Team." Purdue Exponent [West Lafayette, IN] 5 Dec. 2000: 20. Print.

To cite a review, we follow this basic format:

 Review Author. "Title of Review (if there is one)." Rev. of Performance Title, by Author/Director/Artist. Title of Periodical day month year: page. Medium of publication.

For example:

Seitz, Matt Zoller. "Life in the Sprawling Suburbs, If You Can Really Call It Living." Rev. of Radiant City, dir. Gary Burns and Jim Brown. New York Times 30 May 2007 late ed.: E1. Print.

When citing an article in a scholarly journal, we follow the next basic format:

Author(s). "Title of Article." Title of Journal Volume.Issue (Year): pages. Medium of publication.

Bagchi, Alaknanda. "Conflicting Nationalisms: The Voice of the Subaltern in Mahasweta Devi's Bashai Tudu." Tulsa Studies in Women's Literature 15.1 (1996): 41-50. Print.

Citing Web Publications:

The basic format for citing from a web page is the following:

Editor, author, or compiler name (if available). Name of Site. Version number. Name of institution/organization affiliated with the site (sponsor or publisher), date of resource creation (if available). Medium of publication. Date of access.

For example:

The Purdue OWL Family of Sites. The Writing Lab and OWL at Purdue and Purdue U, 2008. Web. 23 Apr. 2008.

In the case that there is no indication of the publisher or sponsor name, we should use the abbreviation n.p. Additionally, if there is no publication date, we use the abbreviation n.d. Moreover, if we are require providing a page, but there is no one provided in the source, we use the abbreviation n. pag.

In case that we have to include the URL, this one should appear in angle brackets after the date of access. For example:

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/›.

Sources:

OWL Purdue Online Writing Lab. The Writing Lab & OWL at Purdue and Purdue University. Web. 14 May 2013.

Effective Writing Center. MLA Formatting. University of Maryland University College. Web. 14 May 2013.

You tube. OWL Purdue, 12 August 2012. Web. 14 May 2013