MLA
General style notes
Before selecting a referencing style check with your tutor, lecturer or supervisor for the style preferred by the School or Department.
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About MLA
The MLA style is often used in the Humanities disciplines including Languages, Literature and Communication. MLA is an in-text citation style with 2 key components: 1. Citations in the text that direct the reader to entries in the Works Cited list. 2. An alphabetical list of sources (Works Cited list) that appears at the end of the paper. The style uses a template of core elements common to most sources such as author, title and publication date. These core elements are used to cite any type of work including books and e-books, journal articles, online images, social media posts, theses etc.
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This guide is based on the MLA Handbook Plus. 9th ed., Modern Language Association of America, 2021.
The handbook is available from the library as an eBook. Print copies are also available from Baillieu library. Please consult the official manual for more information.
Handbook references in Re:cite are given for sections of the manual (eg: 5.1, 6.22), rather than page numbers. Section numbers are consistent across print and online formats.
For further information about the style, see https://www.mla.org/MLA-Style.
These online resources provide more detailed advice on how to cite in the MLA style:
- FAQs: "Ask the MLA." MLA Style Center, style.mla.org/category/ask-the-mla.
- MLA's The Source newsletters: "The Source Archive." MLA Style Center, style.mla.org/the-source-archive.
MLA's Interactive Practice Template is a tool for learning MLA style, although it is not a citation generator.
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What is an in-text citation? How are they formatted?
In-text citations are brief, unobtrusive references that direct readers to the works-cited-list entries for the sources you consulted and, where relevant, to the location in the source being cited. The citation can appear in the prose or in parentheses. Use shortened titles in parenthetical citations. (6.1)
An in-text citation begins with the shortest piece of information that directs the reader to the entry in the works-cited list. It begins with whatever comes first in the entry: the author’s name or the title (or description) of the work. (6.2)
Citation in prose:
Gertrude Himmelfarb discusses this in her chapter on poverty.
Parenthetical citation:
The importance of the concept of the poverty line has been thoroughly discussed (Himmelfarb).
All in-text references should be concise. Do not provide the author’s name or title of a work in both your prose and parentheses.
eg. According to Gertrude Himmelfarb, Charles Booth never used the "the Poverty Line" (103).
In parenthetical citations, use only the part of an author’s name necessary to find the entry in the list of works cited. This is usually the surname.
eg. At least one researcher has discovered a discrepancy in dates (Himmelfarb).
If a specific part of a work is quoted or paraphrased and the work includes a page number, or other indication of where the information can be found in the work, the page number or location marker should be included in parentheses.
Parenthetical citations:
According to Carolyne Lee, “professional literacy includes knowledge of scholarly citation practices” (154).
The author or title can also appear alongside the page number or other location marker in parentheses.
Parenthetical citations:
“Professional literacy includes knowledge of scholarly citation practices” (Lee 154).
Do not precede a page number with p. or pp., as you do in the list of works cited list (6.16).
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General notes on the Works Cited List
References cited in the text must be listed at the end of your paper. Title the list, Works Cited.
Order the Works Cited list alphabetically by author surnames. Where an item has no author it is cited by its title, and ordered in the reference list alphabetically by the first significant word of the title (not A or The) (5.123).
References in the list of works cited at the end of the paper are to be arranged as follows (1.6):
- Begin each entry flush with the left margin.
- For entries that run for more than one line, indent the subsequent line or lines by half an inch from the left margin. This format is sometimes called hanging indentation.
Entries in the Works Cited list are created using the MLA template of core elements - author, title, and publication date, etc. (fig. 5.1).
The MLA style uses the concept of “containers”. A container is a work that contains another work. For example, a book is the container for a book chapter, YouTube is the container of a video clip (See 5.31 and fig. 5.2 of the Handbook for further explanation). Print novels are self-contained.
There can be more than one container. For further explanation see 5.33 of the Handbook.
The MLA elements are listed below in the order they should appear in your citations. The highlighted elements below represent the “container” part of the citation.
Periods are used after the Author element, after the Title of Source element, at the end of each container string, and at the end of each entry. Commas are used mainly between elements within each container and between the surname and the first name when the name in the Author element is inverted (5.120).
Omit any element that does not apply except Title of Source (5.1).
Note: an element name is not always literal and can be applied to a range of situations. For example, Publication Date can include an actual date of publication, a date of composition for unpublished material, the date a performance was attended, and other dates relevant to the work you are citing (5.2).
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- DOIs are more reliable locators than URLs (the web addresses that appear in your browser window), because DOIs remain attached to their sources even if the URLs change. DOIs are therefore more stable, and often more concise (5.84).
- In deciding when to include a URL, follow the preferences of your instructor, institution, or publisher (5.84: see also 5.96 for guidance on shortening URLs).
- An access date for an online work should generally be provided if the work lacks a publication date or if you suspect that the work has been altered or removed (5.111).
Explore resources to help with reference management and enable you to effectively integrate and cite sources into your writing and assessment tasks .