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Academic Integrity and Plagiarism: MLA Style

A guide for helping students understand and avoid plagiarism.

MLA Style Web Sites

Interviews

Interview You Conducted:

Kumar, Pranab. Personal Interview. 20 Sept. 2004.

Interview (General):

Blair, Tony. Interview by David DimblebyQuestion Time. BBC 1. London. 6 July 2004.

McKay, John. Interview by Derek Wang. KUOW NewsKUOW, Seattle, 15 March 2007. Radio. 24 April 2008.

Images

Painting Found Online

Lawrence, Jacob. Revolt on the Amistad. National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, 1989. Web. 25 July 2008.

Photograph Found Online

Liebowitz, Annie. Monument Valley. Brooklyn Museum, New York, 1993. Web. 8 Feb. 2008.

Map Found Online

"Africa Population Density." Map. Perry-Castaneda Library Map Collection. University of Text at Austin, 22 Jun 2007. Web. 10 Jan. 2008.

Government Documents

Generally you will not know the author of a government document. When that is the case, cite the government agency that issued the work as the author. State the name of the government first, followed by the agency's name. Abbreviate common words such as department (Dept.) Follow the guidelines in section 5.6.21 of the MLA Handbook if the work you are citing is not in the examples below.

If the author is known, you can either begin the citation with the government agency, as in the examples above, and list the author's name after the document title, preceded by the word "By" or an abbreviation, such as Ed. Alternatively you can begin the citation with the author's name. Either format is correct.

No Author

United Nations. Feeding the World's Poor. New York: Taylor, 2000.

United States. Cong. Joint Committee on Terrorism. Hearings81st Cong., 1st sess. 14 vols. Washington: GPO, 2001.

United States, U.S. Department of Education. No Child Left Behind. A Toolkit for Teachers. 2004. Web. 6 March 2007.

With Author

United States. U.S. Department of Justice. Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency. Law Enforcement and Juvenile Crime. By Howard N. Snyder. Dec. 2001. Web. 29 June 2002.

OR

Snyder, Howard N. Law Enforcement and Juvenile Crime. United States Department of Justice. Office of Juvenile Crime, Dec. 2001. Web. 29 June 2008.

How to Read MLA Citations

Book

Author's last name, Author's first name. Title. Publisher Name, date. 

Calvino, Italo. Invisible Cities. Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1978. 

Journal from an Online Database

Author's last name, Author's first name. "Title of the Article." Title of the Journal, vol. #, issue no., year of publication, page #. Name of Database, doi: or URL. 

Borders, James. "Form and the Concept Album: Aspects of Modernism in Frank Zappa's Early Releases." Perspectives of New Music, vol. 39, no. 1, 2001, pp. 118-160. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/833535.

Citing Books

One author

Johnson, Roberta. Gender and Nation in the Spanish Modernist Novel. Vanderbilt University Press, 2003.

More than one author

Broer, Lawrence R., and Gloria Holland. Hemingway and Women: Female Critics and the Female Voice. University of Alabama Press, 2002.

Note: For more than three authors, you may name the first author and add et al., or you give all names in full.

An edition other than the first edition

Cree, Alice. Essays on Native American History. 2nd ed. Heritage, 1992.

Multi-volume work

Beckwith, Carol and Angela Fisher. African Ceremonies. 2 vols. Abrams, 1999.

Book Chapter

White, Mark D. "Why Doesn't Batman Kill the Joker?" Introducing Philosophy through Pop Culture: From Socrates to South Park, Hume to House. Eds. William Irvin and David Kyle Johnson. Wiley-Blackwell, 2010. 163-171.

Ebooks

GunasekaranAngappa, Omar Khalil, and Sayed M. Rahman, eds. Knowledge and Information Technology Management: Human and Social Perspectives. New Ideas, 2000. Books 24x7. Web. 22 July 2008.

Citing Articles

Scholarly Journal Articles

Williams, Linda. “Of Kisses and Ellipses: The Long Adolescence of American Movies.” Critical Inquiry 32.2 (2006): 288-340.

Scholarly Journal Article from Library Database

Tolson, Nancy. “Making Books Available: The Role of Early Libraries, Librarians, and Booksellers in the Promotion of African American Children’s Literature.” African America Review, vol. 32, no. 1, 1998, pp. 9-16. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/3042263.

Magazine Articles

Kates, Robert W. “Population and Consumption: What We Know, What We Need to Know.” Environment, Apr. 2000, pp. 10-19.

Magazine Articles from Library Database

Kates, Robert W. “Population and Consumption: What We Know, What We Need to Know.” Environment, Apr. 2000, pp. 10-19.

Newspaper Articles

McKay, Peter A. “Stocks Feel the Dollar’s Weight.” Wall Street Journal 4 Dec. 2006, p. C1+.

Newspaper Article from Library Database

Solache, Sergio. "Mexico's Dam Projects May Flood Villages." USA Today 12 Nov. 2009, p. 8A. Academic OneFile, link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A211925408/AONE?u=whit75390&sid=AONE&xid=01d70324.

Citing Web Sites

Entire Web Site (No Author)

Wardman Library. Whittier College, 2018, whittier.edu/library. Accessed 2 Feb. 2019.

Page on a Website

Kraus, Michael. “The Roots of Economic Inequality.” Yale Insights, Yale University, 4 Dec. 2018, insights.som.yale.edu/insights/the-roots-of- economic-inequality. Accessed 25 March 2019.

Page on Website with No Author

“Tibetan Buddhist Mandalas.” Johnson Museum of Art, Cornell University, 11 Sept. 2007, museum.cornell.edu/exhibitions/tibetan-buddhist-mandalas. Accessed 4 June 2013.

MLA Handbook

In-Text Citations

In-text or parenthetical citations require only the author and page number. If the author is mentioned in the sentence, include only the page number:

Human beings have been described by Kenneth Burke as "symbol-using animals" (3). Human beings have been described as "symbol-using animals" (Burke 3).

If the author is unknown, include a few words of the title:

We see so many global warming hotspots in North America likely because this region has “more readily accessible climatic data and more comprehensive programs to monitor and study environmental change . . . ” (“Impact of Global Warming” 6).

Musical Recordings

Begin the citation with the name of either the composer or the performer, followed by the title of the recording, the performer (if not put first), the format (CD, audio cassette or LP), the manufacturer and the year.

Performer and Composer are the Same or No Composer:

Lewiston, David. Fiestas of Peru: Music of the High Andes. CD. Nonesuch Records, 1995.

Composer and Performer:

Guthrie, Woody. Peter Seeger Sings Woody GuthriePerf. Pete Seeger. Audio cassette. Folkways, 1968.

Films, Television, Radio

Citations for audio/video materials include the author (if available), the title, producing company and date. Other elements vary depending on the type of material. Follow the examples below and refer to the MLA Handbook, if necessary.

Television or Radio Program

"Cuba and Cocaine." Narr. Bill MoyersFrontline. Documentary Consortium. PBS. WTVS, Miami. 18 Jan. 1990. Television.

Films (DVDs, VHS):

With films, list the title, director, form of media, distributor and year. Other items such as the writer, performers and producers are not required but may be included before the distributor.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Dir. Denise Guyen. SVE Inc. 1988. DVD.

It's a Wonderful Life. Dir. Frank CapraPerf. James Stewart, Donna Reed, Lionel Barrymore, and Thomas Mitchell. RKO, 1946. DVD