FAQs about research papers Citing Sources

Writing Issues Italicize titles of movies and books! Sloppy mistakes! Stop! Read your paper aloud to yourself as a way to proofread!

Citing a Book When quoting a book in a paper, you must cite the author’s name and page number. Ex. McCandless “was green, and he overestimated his resilience, but he was sufficiently skilled to last sixteen weeks on little more than his wits and ten pounds of rice ”(Krakauer 182). Notice that there is no period after the quote.

Citing a book continued If you include the author’s name in the sentence, then you only need the page number in your citation. EX. Krakauer points out that McCandless “had a need to test himself in ways, as he was fond of saying, that mattered” (182). Notice how the quotes in the examples are all embedded. Do not use stand alone quotes! Also, it is not necessary to use an ellipsis (……) to show where you break into a sentence at the beginning of a quotes. Use ……to show where you end a quote.

Citing a Website If the website you are using has an author, then put the author’s last name in ( ). If there is no author listed, then you put the first word or two of the title of the web page in ( ). Statistics published by the American Psychological Association on their “Marriage and Divorce” page would look like this. EX. According to the latest statistics, “about 40 to 50 percent of married couples in the United States divorce”(“Marriage”).

More on Citing Websites Websites do not have page numbers, so don’t add page numbers. Do not number paragraphs (the MLA Handbook says not to)

Citing Articles from Databases a citation will follow the guidelines for a newspaper article, magazine article, journal entry, encyclopedia entry, etc. It will be followed by name of the database. Web. Date accessed. The citation is usually found at the bottom of the article. However, not all of them are correct. URL’s are NO LONGER required by MLA! Delete the URL, then add the name of the database. Web. Date accessed.

Creating Works Cited Page using Easybib Make sure you use all the sources you have listed on easybib Delete any that are NOT used in your paper Click on “Export or Print” blue button on the right of the screen Choose “Print as Word Document” “Click here to download” You may also it to yourself

Creating Works Cited page on Word Under “Paragraph” Tab, choose “Hanging” Under “Line Spacing” Tab, choose “Double” Click OK Your paper will space the Works Cited correctly. Do NOT put extra spaces in your work cited page. When you are finished with a citation, hit the “ENTER” button only ONCE to begin a new citation

Attaching Works Cited to your Paper

Review of General v. Specific You need to make broad, general statements about the impact of 1984 before you move into the specifics of your topic. This will cut down on confusion