RESEARCH HANDBOOK: Citing Sources

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For most papers and other research products a list of sources used in producing a work is included. It usually appears at the end of a project on a separate page and is headed "Works Cited." Entries on the list are arranged alphabetically by main entry (e.g., author or other first component).  Format is typically double-spaced, the second line of each entry indented by 5 spaces or 1/2 inch (hanging indent). Titles are either italicized or underlined. Footnote format is discussed at the end of this piece. Most of these forms come from the Modern Language Association manuals. For further examples of both MLA (humanities) and APA (scientific) citation styles see the excellent Bibliography Style Handbook from the Writer's Workshop at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. See also the Scott Foresman page on APA style and the  American Psychological Association page on citing electronic sources. For government documents there is a good site at the University of Memphis Library: Uncle Sam - Brief guide to citing government publications. The MLA's own WWW style rules are online as well. Another great site for sample electronic resource citations is at UC Berkeley: Style Sheets for Citing Internet & Electronic Resources. Try also Citation Styles & Format page at the Sonoma State University Library website which includes a link to the Chicago(Turabian) style sheet at dianahacker.com. The "notes and bibliography" Chicago style is preferred by history teachers.

Two examples
MLA/Chicago = Jones, Jim. How I Created the People's Temple. San Francisco: People's Temple Press, 1972.
APA = Jones, J. (1972). How I Created the People's Temple. San Francisco: People's Temple Press.

For those looking for help making a list, try out one of the following free sites.
NoodleBib Express - http://www.noodletools.com/login.php - is a quick and easy site for formating citations in either MLA or APA style. There is a subscription version of NoodleBib as well.
EasyBib - http://www.easybib.com/ - enables you to fill in the various parts of a citation and then formats it for you. It provides MLA style only. To get APA style you need to subcribe to EasyBib Pro.
Citation Machine - http://citationmachine.net/ - produces APA, MLA and Chicago formats automatically. To start click on the format you want to use in the top left column.

Lastname, Firstname. Title. Place: Publisher, date.
Jones, Jim. How I Created the People's Temple. San Francisco: People's Temple Press, 1972.

Same name after first entry
----------. Title. Place: Publisher, date.
----------. How I Destroyed the People's Temple. Georgetown, Guyana: People's Temple Press, 1978.
 

Lastname, Firstname, [SecondLastname, Firstname] and LastFirstname Lastname.

    Title. Place: Publisher, date.

(In this citation et al. means “and others”)
Lastname, Firstname, et al. Title. Place: Publisher. date.
Torrigino, Mario, et al. How to Win Every Legal Battle You Fight. Pacifica, Calif.: Legal Battle Press. 1989.
 

Title. Place: Publisher, date.
Jimson Weed. Reno: Weed Publishing, 1998.
 

CorporateAuthor. Title. Place: Publisher, date.
People's Temple. How We Let Ourselves Be Abused. San Francisco: People's Temple Press, 1975.
 

(Start with the name of the person who wrote the foreword, preface, etc.)

Lastname, Firstname. Foreword/Preface/etc. Title. By Firstname

    Lastname. [book’s author] Place: Publisher, date. Pages.

Borges, Jorge Luis. Ficciones. Trans. Anthony Kerrigan. New York: Grove Press, 1962.
 

Clement, Jane C., ed. Collected Works of Clint Eastwood. Carmel: Make My Day Press, 1997.
 

Lastname, Firstname. "Selection." Title. Ed. Firstname, Lastname.

    Place: Publisher: date. Pages.

(no place or publisher necessary)

Lastname, Firstname. [if known] "ArticleTitle." EncyclopediaTitle. No. ed. Date.

"The Mbuti." Peoples of the Earth. Ed. Cerise MacDonald. 20 vols. New York: Grolier, 1975.
 

Lastname, Firstname. "ArticleTitle." JournalTitle day Month year [or] volume.

    number [for newspaper include edition if relevant] : page[s]. [for newspapers include section with page, e.g. G3]

Don’t set off titles of laws or acts with underlines, italics or quote marks, but you may abbreviate titles, with the works cited by section and the years added if relevant
21 US Code. Sec. 1401a. 1988.
US Const. Art. 1, sec.1.
Driving a Professor Crazy Act of 1996. Publ. L. 100-418. 14 Nov. 1996. Stat. 99.1496.
[Public Law number. Enactment date. Statutes at Large cataloging number.]

Kaun v. Library of California. 154 USPQ 677. CA Supr. Ct. 1999.
[This case is described in the United States Patent Quarterly, page 677 of volume 154]
 

Title. Chart/Map. Place: Publisher, date.
The Physical World. Map. New York: Rand McNally, 1993.
 

GovernmentAgency. Title. Place: Publisher, date.
US Bureau of the Census. 1990 U.S. Census of Population and Housing. Washington: GPO, 1990.
 

Lastname, Firstname. "Speech title." SponsoringOrganization. Site:

    City. date Month year.

Lastname, Firstname. Personal interview. day Month year.
Brown, Willy. Personal interview. 4 Nov. 1999.
 

Lastname, Firstname. Letter to Firstname Lastname. date Month year.
Frost, Robert. Letter to John Fitzgerald Kennedy. 5 Dec. 1960.
Angelou, Maya. Letter to the author. 25 Dec. 2001. [for a letter you received]
 

Title. Dir. Firstname Lastname. Filmdistributer, date.
The Wizard of Oz. Dir. Victor Fleming. Loew’s Incorporated, 1939.

For a videotape of a previously distributed film add the term videocassette, videodisc, DVD, or other appropriate description after the title and the production year after the director’s name. Name the video distributor and date rather than the film distributor.
The Wizard of Oz. DVD. Dir. Victor Fleming. 1939. MGM/UA Home Video, 1989.
 

(To the extent that a narrator, director, producer, performer, etc. are known, they may be added to the citation with abbreviated title, e.g. Narr., Dir., Prod., Perf., etc., before the name.)

Lastname, Firstname. [as appropriate] Title. [Other information as known]. Production

    Company. LocalChannelName, Place, day Month year.

 (See Appendix for list of information suggested by MLA)

Humanities Style (MLA)

Author, Name. "Title of Document." Title of Complete Work. Date of document. day month year of access <[source]>.

Scientific Style (APA)

Author, A. A. (Date of document). "Title of Document." Title of Complete Work. Retrieved [month day, year], from [source: URL]
 

Lastname, Firstname. “Title of Article.” PeriodicalTitle Vol.no. Issue Date: page(s). Service used. Location accessed. Access date. <URL of service used>. [Note do not use URL of the actual article]
Anderson, J. “Keats in Harlem.” New Republic 204.14 8 Apr. 1991: 27. EBSCO. Bessie Chin Library, Larkspur, CA. 29 Dec. 2001 <http://search.epnet.com/>.
 

MLA
A Guide to for Writing Research Papers Based on Modern Language Association (MLA) Documentation. Humanities Department and Arthur C. Banks, Jr. Library, Capital Community College, 31 May 2000. 28 Mar. 2002 <http://ccc.commnet.edu/mla.htm>.
APA
A Guide to for Writing Research Papers Based on Modern Language Association (MLA) Documentation. (31 May 2000). [Web page posted on Capital Community College (Hartford, Conn.) Web site]. Retrieved Mar. 28, 2002 from the World Wide Web: http://ccc.commnet.edu/mla.htm
 

Lastname, Firstname, "Title of Article." Title of Encyclopedia. Version or edition. Date of publication. Name of Publisher. <URL of service>. (Date of access).  [Note do not use URL of the actual article]
Wharton, Annabel Jane. "Byzantine art." World Book Online. Americas ed. 2002. World Book, Inc. 29 Mar. 2002 <http://worldbook.online.com>.
 

The Avalon Project: Articles of Confederation. 31 Dec. 1969 [1996]. The Avalon Project at Yale Law School. 29 Mar. 2002 <http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/artconf.htm>.
 

Jascot, John. Home page.  29 Mar. 2002 <http://ccc.commnet.edu/faculty/~jascot/jascot.htm>.
 

Du Bois, W. E. B. The Souls of Black Folk. Chicago: A.C. McClurg & Co.; [Cambridge]: University Press John Wilson and Son, 1903; Bartleby.com, 1999. 29 Mar. 2002 <www.bartleby.com/114/>.
 

Blake, William.  “Earth's Answer.”  Dove Cottage. 29 Mar. 2002 <http://www.dovecottage.com/Blake/Earth's%20Answer.html>.
 

Fitter, Chris. “The Poetic Nocturne: From Ancient Motif to Renaissance Genre.” Early Modern Literary Studies 3.1 (Sept.1997): 61 pars.  29 Mar. 2002  <www.humanities.ualberta.ca/emls/03-2/fittnoct.html>.
 

Angier, Natalie. “Chemists Learn Why Vegetables are Good for You.” New York Times 13 Apr. 1993, late ed.: C1. New York Times Ondisc. CD-ROM. UMI-Proquest. Oct. 1993.
“U.S. Population by Age: Urban and Urbanized Area.” 1990 U.S. Census of Population and Housing. CD-ROM. US Bureau of the Census. 1990.
Orchestra. CD-ROM. Burbank: Warner New Media. 1992.
“Albatross.” The Oxford English Dictionary. 2nd ed. CD-ROM. Oxford: Oxford UP. 1992
 

Lastname, Firstname. “Subject Line from Posting.” Online posting. address of the listserv or newslist, date.
For personal e-mail listings, the address may be omitted
Bruckman, Amy.  “MOOSE Crossing Proposal.”  Online posting.  mediamoo@media.mit.edu, 30 Apr. 1994.
Thomson, Barry.  “Virtual Reality.”  Personal e-mail.  25 Jan. 1995.
 

Sources, whether print, online or in any other form, are acknowledged in the body of the text as follows:  ... text (Lastname page). Where there is no page or paragraph number available use last name only.
For a work with no author use the title, abbreviated if necessary to two or three words, as follows:  ... text (“Titleword(s)” page).
 

According to many researchers in the field of genetic engineering, behavior control would be a reality by the turn of the century (Feinberg 95).
 

Shells were used as currency in many Mediterranean countries in the pre-Christian era (“Money” 86)
 

Footnotes appear at the bottom of the page four lines below the last textual line. Single-space each entry: double space between entries. Indent first line by five spaces, and continue the next name at the left edge. Endnotes appear at the end of the entire text on a separate page, numbered in order of their occurrence.
 

^xFirstname Lastname. Title (Place: Publisher, date) page(s).
 

^xLastname, page(s).
 

MLA suggests giving the following information for online sources, including as many items from the list below as are relevant and available