Using MLA Style to Boost Style and Content

 

Integrating Materials                                                                                          

You will be using Modern Language Association (MLA) style to accurately, stylishly, and honestly weave in writings and ideas that you are borrowing from outside sources. MLA style is a very simplistic system based on acknowledging authors and page numbers, much of which can be accomplished by using parenthetical page citations and in-text citations. This is demonstrated quite well in a solid guide such as The Bedford Handbook by Diana Hacker, as well as on her web site and other Internet resources:

http://www.dianahacker.com/resdoc/humanities/english.html (Hacker’s Research and Doc. Online)

http://owl.english.purdue.edu/handouts/research/r_mla.html (Purdue’s OWL)

http://www.wisc.edu/writing/Handbook/DocMLACitation.html (U. of Wisconsin)

Unless it is awkward, the first time you use an outside source, you should mention the author's full name, something about them to establish their credibility (e.g., profession, an accomplishment), and the page number where the words or idea that you've borrowed can be found. After that, last name only will suffice.  Moreover, when integrating someone else’s words or ideas, please keep this formula in mind so that your voice does not get lost:

1) set up the quote/idea;
2) insert it; and
3) build upon it to further your thesis & set-up your next point.

According to sociology professor Amitai Etzioni, many of the jobs available to teens "undermine school attendance and involvement, impart few skills that will be useful later in life, and . . . skew the values of teen-agers" (225).

In his 1986 essay "Working at Mcdonald's," sociologist Amitai Etzioni makes several charged claims about the impact that certain jobs may have on teenagers' ethics and educational priorities (225).

Unfortunately, as some sociological studies have shown, many fast food jobs can "undermine school attendance and involvement, impart few skills that will be useful later in life, and . . . skew the values of teen-agers" (Etzioni 225).

Documenting Materials                                                                                       

The last page of your essay will be called the Works Cited page, so type Works Cited at the top-center.  Jump to a sample works cited page.  Your works will be listed alphabetically according to authors' last names. As shown by Hacker, MLA requires slightly different ways to document sources depending on the type of source (e.g., book, article, movie, web). Since Etzioni's work has been used, his essay must be documented. And since his essay is a work in an anthology or a collection, the following entry for such a work will be used.  Check out Hacker’s other examples too!

Works Cited

Etzioni, Amitai. "Working in McDonald's." Reading Critically, Writing Well: A Reader and Guide. Ed. Rise B.

    Axelrod and Charles R. Cooper. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 1999. 225-29.

 

 
 

In parenthetical references in the text, works on the World Wide Web are cited just like printed works. For any type of source, you must include information in your text that directs readers to the correct entry in the works-cited list (see the MLA Handbook, sec. 5.2). Web documents generally do not have fixed page numbers or any kind of section numbering. If your source lacks numbering, you have to omit numbers from your parenthetical references.

If your source includes fixed page numbers or section numbering (such as numbering of paragraphs), cite the relevant numbers. Give the appropriate abbreviation before the numbers: (Moulthrop, pars. 19-20). (Pars. is the abbreviation for paragraphs. Common abbreviations are listed in the MLA Handbook, sec. 6.4.) For a document on the Web, the page numbers of a printout should normally not be cited, because the pagination may vary in different printouts.

If you are quoting a poem, refer to line numbers, not page numbers.