MLA style was created by the Modern Language Association of America. It is a set of rules for publications, including research papers. Our school uses the 8th version of rules.
There are two parts to MLA: In-text citations and the Works Cited list.
In MLA, you must "cite" sources that you have paraphrased, quoted or otherwise used to write your research paper. Cite your sources in two places:
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Guidelines |
Mnemonic |
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H.A.R.D.
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If the source is from the internet or the Web, use all that is available from the following list:
Author’s name; title of work in quotations; title of the web site, underlined; date of publication or update; sponsor of site ; date you accessed the site; the URL
example:
Works Cited Page:
"Title of Page." NameofWebSite.com. Day Month Year last updated . Day Month Year accessed online
........... <http://www.actualURL>.
In-text citation: (title)
General Format -
Author last name, first name. Book Title. Publisher’s name, year.
Example:
Works Cited Page:
Smith, Jeff. The Making of WWII. MacMullan Press, 1995.
In-text: (smith pg#)
1. Article in Online Magazine -
Example:
Works Cited Page:
"Business Coalition for Climate Action Doubles." Environmental Defense.. 8 May 2007. Environmental Defense Organization. 24 May 2007 <http://www.environmentaldefense.org/article.cfm?ContentID=5828>.
In-text: (author, pg#)
2. Article from Online Newspaper -
Works Cited Page:
Clinton, Bill. Interview. New York Times on the Web. May 2007. 25 May 2007 <http://video.on.nytimes.com/>.
In-text: (author, pg#)
Unknown Author, Page on a Web site -
Works Cited Page:
Global Warming. 2007. Cooler Heads Coalition. 24 May 2007 <http://www.globalwarming.org/>.
In-text: (title, pg#)
YOUTUBE:
“name of video”, Youtube,uploaded by (user or username), day month year uploaded, URL.
Example -
Works Cited Page:
“The Joys of Cooking” , Hungry?, Sousie Johnson, 15 January 2002, https://www.youtube.com/ NJgt349754TV.
In-text:
(The Joys of Cooking, 2002)
Containers are the item that holds a source. Container titles should be placed in italics directly following the title of the source. Since many sources can be cited on their own not every source will have a container. On the contrary, there are instances when a source has multiple containers. In this instance, the additional container(s) information is placed at the end of the citation.
Some single examples with the container in red are:
Articles are in journals songs are on albums posts are on blogs chapters are in books
Some two or more container examples are:
An article, in a journal, found on a database an episode, in a TV series, on an entertainment site a song, on an album, from a music streaming source