Now that you have an idea of how to read
a citation, let's look at how to format
one for your own work. I'm gonna take a
moment and identify the pieces that
you're going to need to create a
citation. The first thing that you're going to
need to know is the type or format of
the source, including whether the source
is a physical publication or an
electronic version. Knowing this will
help you know the pieces that you're
going to need for your citation.
The next part that you're going to need is
details about the publication and this
includes the author, date, title, and
publication information.
The MLA handbook lays out nine core elements for citation.
The core elements in order are author, title, source, title of container, other
contributors, version, number, publisher, publication date and location.
You're going to encounter some sources that do not have every one of these core
elements.
So what can you do when you have a source that does not have
a particular element from that list?
You can skip that element, omit it, and move on to the next core element.
The first element in every MLA citation is the author or creator responsible for the
work. Authors are listed last name first,
followed by a comma, then a space,
and then the first name.
If there are two authors listed, you want
to include information for both. Do this
by putting a comma after the name entry
for the first author, a space, the word,
and, then you're going to reverse how
you put the second name. So it's going to
be listed first name first and then last
name. If there are more than two names
enter the first name in the exact same
format you do with all the other
citations; last name first, comma, space,
then the first name and then you're
going to include the words et. al, which
in Latin means and others and then a
period. Let's let your readers know that
there are multiple authors for that
particular source. If your author is an
organization, like a government agency or
a company, use the organization's name as
the author's name and then the format of the rest of the citation as normal.
You may come across some items that have some
variation when it comes to authors and
there may be some non-traditional
information that you need to include for
the author's section. If a work has
multiple authors and is compelled
by an editor, you want to put the editor as the author.
To see how to do this, check out your MLA handbook. Now there's a lot to remember.
Here the key pieces for most
citations. The first part of a citation
in a works cited page is usually the
author, and the format for the author, if
an individual, is listed last name,
comma, space, first name, period.
