Documentation in MLA Format

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Documentationin MLA Format

• English 1a

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What is MLA?

• MLA Modern Language Association
• Mainly English, philosophy, and other humanities
  use this format.
• Sources are documented in two ways
• Parenthetical in-text
• Works Cited page

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When in Doubt

• Check your current handbook
• MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers, 7th
  Edition, 2009. Print.

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Why should I Document Sources?

• Avoid plagiarism. If it is not your idea, it
  belongs to some one else.
• 2. Back up your ideas and opinions as a credible
  scholar. All research is based on facts that have
  already been established.

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Why should I document sources?

• 3. Maintain a consistent format in the field.
  All who use MLA do the exact same thing.
• 4. Give your readers a chance to look at the
  sources that you cite. By writing such exciting
  papers, your audience will be thrilled to find
  out more about your topic!

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How does MLA Work?

• In-text citations refer to the work cited
  page(s).
• The works cited pages enable your readers to
  locate your sources

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Works Cited Page

• Every citation needs to include this basic
  information
• What is the name of the author
• What is the title of work
• Publication information
• where was it published?
• Who published it?
• When was it published?
• How can it be found (volume, issue, and page
  numbers)?

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A Balancing Act
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Works Cited Sample Page

• Works Cited
• Hughes, Allen and Albert. Interview by Elvis
  Mitchell. Independent Focus The Hughes
  Brothers. Independent Film Channel, 2000. DVD.
• Pruchnic, Jeff. Rhetoric, Cybernetics, and the
  Work of the Body in Burkes Body of Work.
  Rhetoric Review 25.3 (2006) 275-296. Print.
•  Wynne, Deborah. We were unhealthy and
  unsafe Dickenss Great Expectations and All the
  Year Rounds Anxiety Stories. Journal of
  Victorian Culture 5.1 (2000) 45-59. Print.

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Book Citation

• Dick, Philip K. Time Out of Joint. Boston Gregg
  Press, 1979. Print.
• Remember
• Titles must be italicized, not underlined.

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Article in a Scholarly Journal

• Leland, Jacob Michael. Yes, That is a Roll of
  Bills in my Pocket The Economy of Masculinity
  in The Sun Also Rises. Hemingway Review 23.3
  (2004) 37-46. Print.
• Remember
• Italicize titles within journal articles.
• Put quotations marks around the article title.

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Scholarly article from an online database

• George Cheatham. Sign the Wire with Love the
  Morality of Surplus in The Sun Also Rises.
  Hemingway Review 11.2 (1992) 25-30. Academic
  Search Elite. Web. 31 Jan. 2010.
• Remember
• The online database must be italicized.
• What is wrong with this citation?

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A source with the same author

• A source with the same author
• Brantlinger, Patrick. The Reading Lesson The
  Threat of Mass Literacy in the Nineteenth
  Century. Bloomington Indiana UP, 1998. Google
  Scholar. Web 28 Feb 2010.
•  
• ---. What is Sensational about the Sensation
  Novel?. Wilkie Collins Contemporary Critical
  Essays. New York St. Martins, 1998. 30-57.
  Print.

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In-Text Parenthetical Citations

• Use them to
• Directly quote your authors
• Summarize passages
• Paraphrase material

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Parenthetical Citations

• Save time and space by abbreviating information
• Smooth out the flow of the paper
• Refer the reader to the work cited page

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Ways to place an in-text citation

• Two ways of placing an in-text citation
• Add the authors name into the sentence itself
  where the work is quoted, summarized, or
  paraphrased
• As Porfirio claims . . . (179).

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Ways to place an in-text citation

• Place the authors name in the parenthetical
  citation at the end of the passage in which the
  work is quoted, summarized, or paraphrased.
• The jazz functions as the nodal point between
  the mundane tone . . . (Porfirio 179).

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Other Places for Help

• MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers, 7th
  Edition, 2009.
• Quick Access- pgs 378-410
• Purdue Writing Lab
• http//owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/747/01/