1. Documenting Sources in MLA Format
MLA Handbook, 8th ed.

2. Why document? Join in the conversation Give credit to others
Demonstrate that you are trustworthy
Show that you are competent
Prepare for learning the conventions in other fields of study as well
All of this adds up to academic integrity!
5-7

3. Step 1: Collect the information about your sources
“Who is the author?
What is the title?
How was the source published?
Where did you find the source?
When was the source published?”
IMPORTANT: gather the facts from the actual source! 13

4. Step 2: Develop your documentation of the sources
There are two elements of documentation:
Works-cited list
In-text parenthetical citation
“A citation should provide a road map leading to the original source while interrupting the reader’s engagement with text as little as possible If a piece of writing is as clear and error-free as possible and if its documentation is trustworthy, readers will remain focused on the ideas”

5. Creating the List of Works Cited (20)
Core elements:
Author.
Title of source.
Title of container,
Other contributors,
Version,
Number,
Publisher,
Publication date,
Location.
Hey! Look at the punctuation between elements! It matters! 20

6. First Step: Look for the author(s)
This example shows the title page of a book. Below you can see the format for the author’s name:
O’Brian, Patrick.

7. On a Website:
Norton, Amy.

8. From an HTML Article:
Begley, Sharon, and Jeneen Interlandi.

9. From an Article in PDF:
White, Erina.

10. What if there are three authors?
Redlberger-Fritz, Monika, et al.

11. Second Step: Look for the title of the source.
The big question: is this a unit by itself or a part of something larger?
The title of a source that is independent is placed in italics.
The title of a source that is part of something larger is placed in quotation marks.

12. A Book Title: Independent. Italics.
Post Captain.

13. The Title of an Article: Part of Something Larger. Quotation Marks.
This article is published in a journal, the Journal of Evidence-Based Social Work. Thus, the title of the article is placed in quotation marks:
“Science, Pseudoscience, and the Frontline Practitioner: The Vaccination/Autism Debate.”

14. Guidelines for Titles
DO capitalize nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, and subordinating conjunctions;
DO NOT capitalize articles, prepositions, coordinating conjunctions, and the word “to” in infinitives—UNLESS these words are the first word of title or subtitle.
Place a colon between title and subtitle.

15. Third Step: Look for a Container.
Question: What is a container?
Answer: “When the source being documented forms a part of a larger whole, the larger whole can be thought of as a container that holds the source”.
Additional Answer: A container may be “a book that is a collection” of items, a periodical, a web site, or a television series, among others!

16. Finding Containers
A periodical, such as a magazine, journal, or newspaper, is a common type of container. The title of the container is italicized, and a comma comes after it because you will be adding more information about it.
Journal of Evidence-Based Social Work,

17. Other Containers
A website is another common form of container. Many websites contain multiple articles.
WebMD,

18. Other Containers
This listing from the library catalog shows information about a book that is a collection of articles about Nathaniel Hawthorne. The articles are listed at the bottom of the image. The title of this container: The Cambridge Companion to Nathaniel Hawthorne.

19. Nested Containers

20. Examples of Nested Containers
A collection of articles that you found on Google Books
An episode of a TV series that you watched on Netflix
An article from a periodical that you found in Academic Search Premier or Sirs Researcher, titles of databases that contain collections of journals, newspapers, etc.

21. Databases
--probably the kind of nested container that you will use most often!
Periodical
Database
Article

22. Fourth Step: Remember This?
Core elements:
Author.
Title of source.
Title of container,
Other contributors,
Version,
Number,
Publisher,
Publication date,
Location.
Now it’s time to look at the other information that we need to provide about our sources! They are shown in red here.

23. What are “other contributors”?
Here are some of the functions of “other contributors,” . Usually you will put one of these phrases before the name or names; sometimes you will need to use a noun phrase instead.
adapted by
directed by
edited by
illustrated by
introduction by
narrated by
performance by
translated by
general editor

24. Version, Versions of books are called “editions.”
Versions in other kinds of sources may have other names:
director’s cut
version 1.3
unabridged version (38-39)

25. Number,
There are also several kinds of numbers associated with sources. Books may come in multivolume sets. Periodicals may have an issue number and volume number. TV programs have seasons and episode numbers.
Book in a set: vol. 2,
Periodical: vol. 29, no. 5, (“no.” refers to the issue number)
TV series: season 3, episode 1,

26. Publisher,
What organization brings us this source? This is easy for books—just look on the title page: W. W. Norton

27. Publisher of Web Sites
In the case of websites, the publisher is the organization that publishes the site. The example shows the publisher of the Mayo Clinic’s website:
Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research,

28. When is the publisher not needed?
When there is no publisher!
For periodicals
For a website whose site name is the same as that of the publisher
For a website that makes the sources available but does not have anything to do with producing them, such as YouTube.

29. Publication Date,
Many sources have more than one available date. For a book, the choice is simple: use the most recent date. It is usually found on the copyright page, the page right after the title page:
1990,

30. Publication Date for Other Sources
Periodical articles:
Found on a website: give the date of its online publication.
Found in a print periodical: give the date on the magazine or journal hard copy.
Found on a database: most often, the available date is the same as the date of print publication.
For the journal article below, the date is May/June 2014,

31. And Finally, Location.
The term “location” has several different meanings.
In a print source that is a container, it refers to a page range
In a web source, it refers to a URL (web address) or DOI (digital object identifier). Use a DOI or permalink if available!
Here is the Permalink for the journal article from the previous slide:
Here is the DOI: / It is much shorter!
Here is the URL for the article from WebMD:

32. Now, back to the core elements!
Author.
Title of source.
Title of container,
Other contributors,
Version,
Number,
Publisher,
Publication date,
Location.
When you create a works-cited entry, decide which elements apply to your source and fill them in!

33. Example: An entry for a book
Core elements:
Author. Yes! O’Brian, Patrick.
Title of source. Yes—in italics, because this is a book! Post Captain.
Title of container, No container here!
Other contributors, None
Version, None
Number, None
Publisher, Yes! W. W. Norton,
Publication date, Yes! 1990.
Location. Not needed.
O’Brian, Patrick. Post Captain. W. W. Norton, This book is part of a series. If I want to add the name of the series and the number of the book, I may do so: O’Brian, Patrick. Post Captain. W. W. Norton, The Aubrey-Maturin Series 2.

34. The process is a bit more complicated if there is a container, and even more so if there are two containers!

35. Example: An Entry for an Article
Core elements:
Author. Yes! White, Erina.
Title of source. Yes! “Science, Pseudoscience, and the Frontline Practitioner: The Vaccination/Autism Debate.”
Title of container, Yes! Journal of Evidence-Based Social Work,
Other contributors, No
Version, No
Number, Yes! vol. 11, no. 3,
Publisher, Not needed
Publication date, Yes! May/June 2014,
Location. Yes! pp
Container 2: Yes!
Title of container: SocINDEX with Full Text,
Location: Yes! doi: /
Note: the information needed for a database is just the title and the location.

36. White, Erina. “Science, Pseudoscience, and the Frontline
White, Erina. “Science, Pseudoscience, and the Frontline Practitioner: The Vaccination/Autism Debate.” Journal of Evidence-Based Social Work, vol. 11, no. 3, May/June 2014, SocINDEX with Full Text, doi: /
1. Author
2. Article Title
3. Title, numbers, date, and location for the first container, the journal.
4. Title and location for the second and larger container, the database.

37. Finished Entry:
White, Erina. “Science, Pseudoscience, and the Frontline Practitioner: The Vaccination/Autism Debate.” Journal of Evidence-Based Social Work, vol. 11, no. 3, May/June 2014, SocINDEX with Full Text, doi: /

38. Formatting the Whole List
Double space.
Use hanging indent, .5 inches.
Use alphabetical order for the entire list.

39. What is a “Works Consulted” List?
A list of works consulted includes all the sources you looked at, not just the ones that you have actually used and cited in your paper. Check with your instructor to see if you may need a works-consulted list.

40. Using MLA to mention your source in the paper itself
So far, we have been discussing the way to give full information about each source in the works-cited list so that the reader can find the source if need be.
Now we turn to the in-text citation.
In the in-text citation, you will give the reader the information needed to locate the source in the works-cited list and to locate the information in the source.

41. Two parts of the citation
“the element that comes first in the entry in the works-cited list (usually the author’s name)”
Page number
The page number is placed in a parenthesis.
The author’s name may appear in your sentence or in the parenthesis (54).

42. Example
The source: Baron, Naomi S. “Redefining Reading: The Impact of Digital Communication Media.” PMLA, vol. 128, no. 1, Jan. 2013, pp The in-text citation: According to Naomi Baron, reading is “just half of literacy. The other half is writing” (194). Just page # when name is used OR Reading is “just half of literacy. The other half is writing” (Baron 194). Name and page # when name is not used.

43. What if you are paraphrasing instead of quoting the source?
The parenthetical citation method is the same! Example: While reading may be the core of literacy, Naomi Baron argues that literacy can be complete only when reading is accompanied by writing. OR: While reading may be the core of literacy, literacy can be complete only when reading is accompanied by writing (Baron 194).

44. What if two of your sources have the same author?
In this case, you will have to add a short title of each source, so we can tell which source you are using:
Reading is “just half of literacy. The other half is writing” (Baron, “Redefining” 194).
(This source is an article, and the first word of its title is “Redefining.”)

45. What if the first element in the works-cited entry is a title?
Cite by the title! In this example, the source is a book: Reading at Risk: A Survey of Literary Reading in America notes that despite an apparent decline in reading during the same period, “the number of people doing creative writing—of any genre, not exclusively literary works—increased substantially between 1982 and 2002” (3). Use the full title if you are mentioning it in your sentence.

46. Let’s look at the same passage, cited in parenthesis:
Despite an apparent decline in reading during the same period, “the number of people doing creative writing—of any genre, not exclusively literary works—increased substantially between 1982 and 2002” (Reading 3). Use a short form of the title if you are citing it in the parenthesis.

47. Block Quotation
In “Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics,” Tolkien writes,
The significance of a myth is not easily to be pinned on paper by analytical reasoning. It is at its best when it is presented by a poet who feels rather than makes explicit what his theme portends; who presents it incarnate in the world of history and geography, as our poet has done. (63)
Note: indent a half-inch on the left if you have a prose quotation longer than four full lines. Do not use quotation marks unless they are present in the passage you are quoting. Double space