This class uses MLA format for its assignments. MLA is one of the common style guides used by scholars. A style guide is simply the set of rules about what your document should look like so that you're both internally consistent with yourself but also consistent with your peers.

You can download a premade Word document to use as well as view examples of citation on our MLA guide.

Document Set-Up

  • 1" margins (these days, that should be the default)
  • Times New Roman font
  • Font size 12
  • Double-spaced
  • No extra space between paragraphs or around the title of your paper
  • Inside the header (top margin), upper-right corner: your last name and page number (e.g. Smith 1)
  • Four-line heading (does not go inside the margin: it takes up space on page 1):
    • Your Name
    • Prof. Name
    • Course
    • Date
  • Title is centered, with no other formatting or styling
  • Each paragraph is indented half an inch (hit the tab key once)

 

Citations: In-Text

Whether you quote, paraphrase, or summarize, when you use info not original to you (i.e. not your own opinions or conclusions), you need to cite where it came from.

A parenthetical citation in MLA should come before the period for a sentence, typically. It's a reflection of the first piece of info in the full Works Cited citation. Usually this is an author's last name, but if a source doesn't have an author, the first part of the citation will be some of the article title instead. If there is a relevant page number or time stamp (for a video or audio recording), include that, too!

  • Words words words (Smith).
  • Words words (Smith 32).
  • Words words (Smith 3:43).
  • Smith says words (32).*
  • Smith says words (Jones 32).*

*If you promote the author to be named in the sentence, A) make sure they're important enough to namedrop and not just some random writer, and B) make sure the person saying the thing is actually the author of the source you got it from... if not, you'll still need a separate parenthetical citation.

 

Citations: Works Cited

MLA has a kind of checklist for writing citations that all source types use.

The simplified version of that checklist for an Internet article:

  1. Author.
  2. "Title of Article/Page."
  3. Title of Thing the Article Appears In,
  4. Publisher of The Thing,
  5. Date source was published or updated,
  6. url (without http:// in front).

The simplified version of that checklist for a scholarly article:

  1. Author.
  2. "Title of Article."
  3. Title of Journal the Article Appears In,
  4. vol. #,
  5. [issue] no. #,
  6. Date of publication,
  7. page range for original publication.
  8. Name of Database or Website Hosting the Article,
  9. url (sans http://) or DOI (doi.org/######).

The simplified version of that checklist for a book or e-book:

  1. Author.
  2. Title of Book.
  3. Publisher,
  4. Year published.
  5. If e-book: Name of Database or Website Hosting the Book,
  6. If e-book: url (sans http://) or DOI (doi.org/######).