MLA Citation Notes

Why should I bother? It’s about academic honesty—give credit

where credit is due It’s about covering your gluteus

maximus in case the information in your research turns out to be inaccurate or biased

It’s REQUIRED

What do you expect me to do? You should cite any sources used for

your project using citations, a works cited page, and parenthetical references

#1 What is a citation? It summarizes bibliographic data to provide

your reader (teacher) information to locate the book, website, or magazine that you used: Author (if given) Title of article, webpage, or entry Publication information (publisher, website,

magazine title, date, location) Medium (Print, Web, etc.) Date of access

How is a citation formatted? Each citation or entry follows a specific

format

Punctuation used in the citation defines different types of information in the entry. Formatting is VERY important

The parts of the citation follow a specific order and have their own function.

“Preview: 2008 Dodge Challenger." Billy Bubba’s Hemiworld. 9 Feb. 2006. Web. 28 June 2006.

What does a citation look like?

This citation example is for a webpage. Other sources will look different and will have other kinds of information.

“Preview: 2008 Dodge Challenger." Billy Bubba’s Hemiworld. 9 Feb. 2006. Web. 28 June 2006.

What’s up with punctuation?Titles of articles, webpages, or entries in a reference work are usually noted by quotation marks.

Titles of books, websites, or reference sources are usually noted with italics.

Each part of the citation is completed with a period.

Dates in MLA citations follow a specific format. It’s very European.

You need to define in what medium you accessed the material. If you got it from the web, use “Web.”

What goes in quotes and which gets italicized?

Your citation should go from specific to general

Author always goes first, but if there is no author, you need to list the title of the entry first. That gets the “quotation treatment”

Next, include the larger work in which that content was found. It was probably part of a book, magazine, or website. That source gets the italic treatment. If you have to write an entry by hand for any reason,

you may underline the source instead of italicizing it.

Mrs. Vessell…I still don’t get it…

If you got an article from an encyclopedia: “Lewis and Clark” is the specific article World Book is the larger source

If you got an article from a website: “Terrorists get their day in court” is the article CNN.com is the larger source

If you got an article from a magazine: “Obama challenged by right” is the article Time is the larger source

What are the other mediums? Print. is used for almost anything printed on

paper. Examples are books, reference magazines, pamphlets, etc.

Web. Is used for any web-based content. Other medium examples include:

CD Film Television

Ask yourself—by which medium did you get the information?

#2 What is a works cited page?

The works cited page is an alphabetical listing of all cited sources for your research. This list could include books, websites,

databases, interviews, and any other source of information used.

Remember that if you use someone else’s ideas, words, quotes, data, or other information, you must cite your source.