Citing Your Research Using MLA or APA Style

by Steven D. Krause

What is Citation For, Anyway?

As I’ve discussed throughout The Process of Research Writing Writing, citation is one of the key elements that distinguishes academic research writing from other kinds of writing. Academic readers are keenly interested in knowing where the writer found her evidence, in many cases so the reader can retrieve that evidence and read it themselves if they want.

Second, academic writers are also very interested in giving credit to other writers’ ideas. As I discussed in chapter three, “Quoting and Paraphrasing Your Research,” to not give proper credit to another writer’s words or ideas is plagiarism. To not use citation in academic writing is simply against the rules.

So, in the most general sense, the goal of citation in academic writing is pretty straight-forward: properly citing your research in your writing explains to your readers where you found the evidence to support your points.

Finding Out More About MLA and APA Citation

There are several different sets of “rules” that academics use for citing research. The two most commonly used in writing classes and used by academics working in the humanities (things like English, history, philosophy, Women’s studies, and education) and the “soft sciences” (psychology, sociology, political science, and so forth) are the guidelines of the Modern Language Association and those of the American Psychological Association.

While academic journals that focus on scholarship having to do with literature and language tend to follow the MLA guidelines, there are other English studies journals that use the style rules of the APA.

This chapter includes an abbreviated version of the basic rules of both MLA and APA style you will need to cite most types of materials you include in your research project. But for materials and details about citation that you don’t find included here, you may want to consult the official style guides, their Web sites, or other documentation sources.

The definitive guide for the rules of MLA is:

Gibaldi, Joseph. MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers. Sixth Edition. New York: Modern Language Association of America, 2003.

For APA style, the definitive guide is:

American Psychological Association. Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association. Fifth Edition. Washington: APA, 2001.

Both the MLA and APA style guides are very complete. However, as you work on citing your research and review the guidelines I offer here, keep in mind two things:

• No style guide accounts for everything. While there are rules of citation for almost all of the different types of evidence you might use in your research projects, you might come across some type of evidence that doesn’t seem to be covered. Talk with your teacher when this happens, but you may need to approximate what you think is the proper citation style.

• Style guides are evolving, changing, and open to interpretation. While it may seem that the rules for citation in MLA, APA, and other style guides have always and forever been the same and are completely beyond any interpretation, this is not the case. The most obvious recent example as to how style guides change is the internet. Up until a few years ago, there were no good rules with any of the common style guides as to how to cite information from a web site because there were no web sites.
An Abbreviated Guide to MLA Style

Parenthetical Citation
MLA style uses “parenthetical citation” instead of footnotes or endnotes to indicate within the text the source of a quote or a paraphrase. There should be enough information within the parenthetical citation to help your reader locate the complete bibliographic information on your “works cited” page.

In MLA style, it’s best to weave parenthetical citations into the flow of the sentence—avoid merely “dropping” citations into the text that disrupt it. Also, be sure that the parenthetical citation information clearly refers to the material you are citing. See Chapter Three, “Quoting and Paraphrasing Your Research,” for suggestions on how to do this effectively.

Author in a phrase
Whenever possible, incorporate the name of the author into the sentence and note the page number in the parentheses. Use the author’s full name on the first reference, and the author’s last name on each subsequent reference.

Sara Baase writes in A Gift of Fire “The desire for the advantages of small community life … is prompting many professionals and knowledge workers to move to small towns” (296).

Author in the citation
When you don’t name the author in the sentence, you need to include it in the parenthetical citation.

Still, many people “prefer city life for its vibrancy and career and social opportunities” (Baase 296).

Two or three authors
Name all of the authors, preferably in the sentence, but if not, in the parenthetical citation. Use the authors’ full names on the first reference, and the authors’ last names on each subsequent reference.

As David D. McKenny, Werner M. Newhausser, and David Julius explain, while we know a lot about how people detect heat, “little is known about how we detect cold” (52).

Group or corporate author
If the text is the product of a group, a committee, a corporation, etc., use the group or corporate author as you would an author name.

According to the National Research Council’s report Inland Navigation System Planning, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers finds itself between those advocating for commerce and those wanting to protect the environment (ix).

Unknown author
Use the title of the work or a shortened version of it instead of the author’s name. Generally speaking, you should avoid using phrases like “anonymous” or “unknown author.”

As reported in the article “TV Dropped from Medicare Bill,” …

Author of two or more pieces of evidence in your project
It’s not uncommon to cite different works from the same author in an essay. When this happens, you need to make it clear in your citation which work you are quoting.

The Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Center was designed to combat cybercrime (Markoff, “New Center,” C-2).

Work in an anthology
When you quote a work that is reprinted in an anthology, use the name of the author of the work (not the name of the editor) and the page numbers from the anthology. In your Works Cited page, you will note the name of the editor and the anthology.

Lehan connects the character Gatsby with other myths of man-god figures, both as seen through his eyes and the eyes of other characters (80-1).

Indirect source
An indirect quote is when you quote from a piece of evidence where that writer is quoting someone else. To properly cite indirect quotes, use the abbreviation “qtd.” in the parenthetical citation to explain the source of the indirect quote.

Steve Miller said “I have no financial incentive to kid you about anything” (qtd. in Naughton 24).

A work without a page number (including Web sites)
This would include quotations and paraphrases from a Web site or other Internet source, from a television show, a radio program, and so forth. On the first reference to this sort of evidence, try to work an explanation of the source within the sentence itself to make it clear why you aren’t noting a page number.

“The Term Hacker,” according to Susan Brenner’s web site Cybercrimes.net, “also tends to connote membership in the global community defined by the net.”

The CNN web site reported about a recent international conference about Internet crime in the article “World cybercrime experts see need for laws, ties.”

You should also use this approach when you are citing newspaper, journal, or other types of articles that originally appeared in a “traditional” print source but that you discovered through a Web site or a database that did not note page numbers. This can make for some awkward phrasing, but it is important to indicate that the version of the text you are using is not paper-based but is Web-based.

According to Robert Pear in his 1999 article “Drug Companies Getting F.D.A. Reprimands for False or Misleading Advertising,” available through the New York Times Web Site, “The Federal Government has repeatedly reprimanded drug companies” for making false claims in their ads.

On references after the first one to the evidence, refer to it by the last name of the author.

Formatting of Works Cited Pages, Annotated Bibliographies, and Works Consulted Documents
Whenever you include quotes and paraphrases in your research essays, you must note the bibliographic information about where you found this evidence. In MLA style, this is called a “Works Cited” page. The “Works Cited” page is a list of citations which is alphabetized based on author’s last names (or, if a piece of evidence doesn’t have an author, on the title of the evidence, not counting the words “A,” “An,” or “The”) that explains where you found your research.

Works cited pages include only the evidence that you quoted in your essay. Unlike an annotated bibliography (like the project I describe in Chapter Six), a works cited pages include only a citation and not an annotation. Finally, you might be required to put together a “Works Consulted” list. This is a list of citations for all the work that you considered but didn’t necessarily quote in your research project.

MLA style calls for Works Cited pages to be double-spaced with a hanging indent of a half inch, as you can see in the examples here. The specific format for each of your entries on your Works Cited page will vary according to the type of evidence. But in general, each of your entries should include enough information about the research you are quoting or paraphrasing so that the reader could find this research themselves if they wanted to find it.

Books
Works Cited entries for a book always include:

• The Author or authors. Last name first of the first author; for each author after that, it is first name first.

• Title of the book. You should underline the title or put it in italics.

• Publication information. This includes the name of the publisher and the city of publication.

• Year of publication.

Book, single author
Brackett, Virginia. F. Scott Fitzgerald: Writer of the Jazz Age. Greensboro, NC : Morgan Reynolds Publishers, 2002.

Book, two or more authors
With multiple authors, list the first author last name first, separated from the author’s first name with a comma. List all of the authors first name followed by the last name.

Jennings, Simon, Michel J. Kaiser, and John D. Reynolds. Marine Fisheries Ecology. Oxford: Blackwell Science, 2001.

Book, corporate or group author
National Research Council. Inland Navigation System Planning: The Upper Mississippi River—Illinois Waterway. Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 2001.
Selection from an anthology or a chapter from a book that is edited

Lehan, Richard. “The Great Gatsby–The Text as Construct: Narrative Knots and Narrative Unfolding.” F. Scott Fitzgerald : New Perspectives. Eds. Jackson R. Bryer, Alan Margolies, and Ruth Prigozy. Athens, GA: U Georgia P, 2000. 78-89.
Don’t use “p.” or “pp.” for noting page numbers.

If you include two or more items from the same anthology or edited book, you should list the edited book as an entry by itself in the works cited page.

Bryer, Jackson R., Alan Margolies, and Ruth Prigozy, Eds. F. Scott Fitzgerald : New Perspectives. Athens, GA: U Georgia P, 2000.
In addition, list each of the selections from the anthology according to the author of the selection, the title, and then a reference to the anthology.

Lehan, Richard. “The Great Gatsby–The text as construct: narrative knots and narrative unfolding.” Bryer, Margolies, and Prigozy, 78-89.

Book, translation
Derrida, Jacques. Writing and Difference. Trans. Alan Bass. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1978.
Book, edition other than the first

Baase, Sara. Gift of Fire : Social, Legal, and Ethical Issues for Computers and the Internet. 2nd ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2003.

Entry from a reference work
If there is a specific author for the entry, list it. Otherwise, begin with the title of the entry.

Gale, Robert L. “Nick Carraway.” An F. Scott Fitzgerald Encyclopedia. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1998.
“Crime.” The Random House Dictionary of the English Language. 2nd ed. New York: Random House, 1987.

Periodicals

Works Cited entries for magazines, journals, newspapers, and other periodicals include:
• The Author or authors. Last name first of the first author; for each author after that, it is first name first.

• Article Title. Enclose the title and sub-title in quotes, with the period at the end of the title inside the quotes.

• Publication information. This includes the periodical title, underlined or italicized; the volume and issue number, when they are available; and the date of publication. For journals, the year goes in parentheses followed by a colon and the page numbers. For magazines and newspapers, list the month or the day and the month before the year, and don’t use parentheses. Don’t use “p.” or “pp.” to indicate page numbers.

• Date of publication. This listing will vary according the frequency of the periodical, whether or not it is published by volume, and so forth.

Article in a weekly magazine
Wood, Chris. “Fighting Net Crime.” Macleans 12 June 2000: 38-40.

Article in a monthly magazine
Canby, Peter. “The Forest Primeval: A Month in Congo’s Wildest Jungle.” Harper’s Magazine July 2002: 41-56.
Article in a newspaper

Markoff, John. “New Center Will Combat Computer Security Threats.” The New York Times 1 October 1999: C2.

Editorial or Letter to the Editor
After the title, indicate if the selection is an editorial or a letter as indicated in the examples below.

McLoughlin, Mary Lou. Letter. Newsweek 5 August 2002: 12.
“Hauptman, Timmer, Carlberg for Council.” Editorial. The Ann Arbor News 22 October 2002: A8.

Article in a journal paginated by volume
Some academic journals number the pages according to the volume instead of the issue.

Vann, Irvin B., and G. David Garson. “Crime Mapping and Its Extension to Social Science Analysis.” Social Science Computer Review 19 (2001): 471-479.

Article in a journal paginated by issue
Some academic journals number the pages of each issue. When this is the case, put a period after the volume number and before the issue number.

Mansfield, Peter. “The Cancer Industry.” The Ecologist 32.3 (2002): 23.

Unsigned article in a periodical
When no author’s name is available in any type of periodic publication, begin with the name of the article. When alphabetizing it on your Works Cited page, exclude “A,” “An,” and “The.” For example, an unsigned article in a magazine would look like this:

“An Overdose on Drug Advertising. Is it Driving Up Costs?” Business Week 22 May 2000: 52.
Electronic and Internet-based Sources

Properly citing things from electronic and Internet-based sources like the World Wide Web, email, newsgroups, and CD-ROMs can be confusing. Because these resources are still relatively “new” to the academic community (at least relative to things like books and paper journals), there is still some debate about the precise method of citing some of these sources. The sixth edition of the MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers makes a lot of progress in addressing these kinds of sources, but questions remain and new types of electronic sources are coming available all the time.

Even though electronic and internet-based sources may look different from traditional journals and books, the basic elements and goals of citation remain the same. Entries should include:

• Author or Authors, which again, should be last name first of the first author and first name first for each author after the first. Unlike traditional books and periodicals, the names of authors of electronic resources (especially Web sites) are often located at the end of the article or another location.

• Title of the article or selection. For an online journal or periodical, a selection from a database, a scholarly project, or similar resource, indicate the title of the article or selection with quotes.

• Publishing information. This might be the title of the online journal or periodical, or the name of the database, scholarly project, or similar resource. This information should appear underlined or in italics.

• Date of publication. As is the case with periodicals, this listing will vary according the frequency of publication of the periodical, whether or not it is published by volume, and so forth. As is the case with the names of the author or authors, finding the date of publication for many electronic resources is challenging. Be sure to look for it carefully, including at the end of the selection.

There are two other elements that are generally common to electronic and internet-based sources:

• Information about the type of electronic resource. As the examples suggest, you need to indicate that your piece of evidence is from an electronic database, a Web site, an email message, and so forth.

• The date of access. Quite literally, this means the date that you found the research. This is important because, as most “Web surfers” have experienced, electronic resources can change and be unavailable without warning.

A “text only” periodical article available via an electronic database
Most community college, college, and university libraries nowadays offer their patrons access to electronic versions of some traditional print resources. These databases, such as Wilson Select and Articles First, include “full text” of articles that appeared originally as an article in the print publication as part of the entries.

These sorts of electronically available resources are just as credible as print resources because they are essentially one in the same. The electronic version of an article from Time magazine is just as credible as the same article from the “paper version” of Time magazine. The concern comes in how you properly cite this material.

If the periodical article is available to you as “text only” and it does not include page numbers, layout, or graphics, you need to indicate clearly that you are accessing that article via an electronic database. To properly cite an article that is only text, you need to first note all of the relevant information you would in a print version of the article and then indicate information about the electronic database, including:

• The name of the database. In this example, Wilson Select.
• The library or library system where you accessed that database. In this case, it would be Eastern Michigan University Halle Library. If you don’t know this information, write “Electronic.”
• The date of access. That is, when you found the article.
• The address of the database or where you accessed the database.

Wechsler, Jill. “Minority Docs See DTC Ads as Way to Address ‘Race Gap.’” Pharmaceutical Executive May 2002: 32, 34. WilsonSelect Database. Eastern Michigan University Halle Library. 20 October 2002. <http://www.emich.edu/halle>.

A “PDF” periodical article available via an electronic database
Increasingly, databases like Wilson Select are making articles available in Portable Document Format (PDF). PDFs, which have to be downloaded to a computer and viewed or printed out with software like Adobe Acrobat, look exactly like the print version of a periodical article. They include page numbers, graphics, charts, and anything else associated with the original layout. Essentially, they are the same as the print version (or at least a photocopy of the print version).

Because of this, I recommend that you cite PDF versions of periodical articles that you find via an electronic database the same way that you cite an article you find with print.

Article in a Periodical Published on the World Wide Web
To cite an article from a periodical that is published on the World Wide Web, adapt as closely as possible the rules for citing articles that appear in print. The major difference is you need to indicate the Web address or “URL” of the publication.

Sauer, Geoffrey. “Hackers, Order, and Control.” Bad Subjects February 1996. 15 August 2002. <http://eserver.org/bs/24/sauer.html>.

Goozner, Merrill, and Andrew Sullivan. “The Pharmaceutical Industry.” Slate 9 April 2001. 13 January 2002. <http://slate.msn.com>

Article in a Web Version of a Print Periodical or Other Media Outlet
Many newspapers and popular magazines release a “web version” of the publication. Cite these sorts of documents as you would articles from a periodical published on the Web.

Pear, Robert. “Drug Companies Getting F.D.A. Reprimands for False or Misleading Advertising.” New York Times 28 March 1999. 15 August 2002. <http://www.nytimes.com>.

“World Cybercrime Experts See Need for Laws, Ties.” CNN.com 16 October 2002. 24 October 2002. <http://www.cnn.com>.

Book Being Accessed Electronically Through a Database or The Web
As is the case with periodicals, include the same information you would with a traditional print book, along with the date of access and the information about the database of the Web site.

Icove, David J., Karl A. Seger, and William R. VonStorch. Computer Crime: A Crimefighter’s Handbook. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly and Associates, 1995. Net Library E-Book. Eastern Michigan University Halle Library. 27 October 2002. <http://www.emich.edu/halle>.
Scholarly or Reference Web-based Database

F. Scott Fitzgerald Centenary Homepage. University of South Carolina. 16 July 2002.
< http://www.sc.edu/fitzgerald/>.

General Web Page or Web Site
If available, include the author or authors of the Web page or site, the title, and the date of publication. If there is no title available, include a descriptive phrase such as “home page,” not underlined, italicized, or within quotation marks.

Stanger, Keith. “Library Guy” Keith Stanger’s Home Port. 7 September 2002. 24 October 2002. <http://keithstanger.com>
Krause, Steven. Home page. 28 March 2005. <http://www.stevendkrause.com>.
When you are missing information about the web site, cite based on the information that you have available.

Posting to a emailing list, online group, or newsgroup
Begin with the author’s name (even if the name is obviously a pseudonym), followed by the subject line of the post, the phrase Online posting, the name of the emailing list, group, or newsgroup, and the URL of the group, if available. If it’s possible, cite from the group’s archives.

Denkinger, Troy. “Re: [SLE] very newbie network quest.” Online Posting. 1 February 2000. English SuSE Linux Discussions. 24 October 2002. <http://lists.suse.com/archive/suse-linux-e/
2000-Feb/>.

Email message
Poe, Marshall. “Re: Reflections/Questions about your JEP article.” Email to the author. 5 June 2002.
Synchronous communication message
This would include a posting in a MOO, a MUD, an IRC, or other chat format. Whenever possible, be sure to cite from the group’s archives.

Spehar, Donna L. “Researching Who Done It: Building Online Research Skills for Composition II Students.” C&W Online 2001/Connections MOO. 16 April 2001. 24 October 2002. <http://web.nwe.ufl.edu/cwonline2001/archives/
sphear-0416.html>.

CD-ROM, diskette, or similar medium
Cite this kind of source like you were citing the print version of the resource, but indicate the nature of the medium in the citation.

Johns Hopkins University and the Annenberg/CPB Project. A Doll House: Based on the Play by Henrik Ibsen. South Burlington, VT: The Annenberg/CPB Multimedia Collection, 1997.

Other Kinds of Sources

Interview
List the person interviewed as if they were the author. If the interview came from another source (radio or television, for example), indicate that with the citation information. If it is an interview that you conducted, be sure to list that and how you conducted the interview (personal interview, telephone interview, email interview, etc.)

Simmons, Gene. Interview with Terry Gross. Fresh Air. National Public Radio. 4 February 2002.
Wannamaker, Annette. Personal Interview. 13 August 2000.

Lecture or Speech
List the name of the speaker, the title in quotation marks, the name of the institution or group sponsoring the speech, the place, and the date. If there is no title for the speech, use an appropriate label such as “Lecture” or “Keynote speech.”

Mauk, Jonathan. “Anti-Reading: Evaluating Student Essays in Current-Traditional Pedagogy.” Conference on College Composition and Communication Convention. Milwaukee, WI. 29 March 1996.

Government Document
If identified, begin with the last name of the author; if not, begin with the name of the government followed by the appropriate agency or subdivision. Only abbreviate things if they can be easily understood. For congressional documents, be sure to note the number, session, and house of Congress (“S” for Senate and “H” or “HR” for House of Representatives), and the type (Report, Resolution, Document, etc.) in abbreviated form, and number the material. If you are citing from the Congressional Record, provide only the date and page number. Otherwise, end with the publication information, often the Government Printing Office (GPO).

United States Congress, House Committee on Resources, Subcommittee on Fisheries Conservation, Oceans, and Wildlife. Ecosystem-based Fishery Management and the Reauthorization of the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act. U.S. House 107th Congress. Washington, D.C.: U.S. GPO, 2002.

Pamphlet or Brochure
Treat pamphlets and brochures as books. If the name of the author is unavailable, begin with the name of the pamphlet or brochure.

Sun Safety for Kids: The SunWise School Program. Washington, DC: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 2000.

Film, DVD, or Videocassette
Generally, begin with the title, underlined or italicized. Then list the director, the company distributing the work, the version of the work you are citing if it is either a DVD or video, and the year of release. If you are focusing on a particular performer, director, producer, or writer, you can begin with that person’s name. For example:

The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. Dir. Peter Jackson. New Line Cinema, 2001.

Luhrmann, Baz, dir. Moulin Rouge. 2000. DVD. Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment, 2001.

Television or Radio Program
Cite the way that you would a film, DVD or video, but be sure to note the network.

The Daily Show. John Stewart. Comedy Central Network. 24 October 2002.
All Things Considered. National Public Radio. 24 March 2001.

An Abbreviated Guide to APA Style