MLA In-Text Citations: The Basics

Guidelines for referring to the works of others in your text using MLA style are covered in chapter six of the MLA
Handbook and in chapter seven of the MLA Style Manual. Both books provide extensive examples, so it's a good idea to
consult them if you want to become even more familiar with MLA guidelines or if you have a particular reference question.
Basic In-Text Citation Rules
In MLA style, referring to the works of others in your text is done by using what is known as parenthetical citation. This
method involves placing relevant source information in parentheses after a quote or a paraphrase.
General Guidelines
The source information required in a parenthetical citation depends (1.) upon the source medium (e.g. Print, Web,
DVD) and (2.) upon the sources entry on the Works Cited (bibliography) page.
Any source information that you provide in-text must correspond to the source information on the Works Cited
page. More specifically, whatever signal word or phrase you provide to your readers in the text, must be the first
thing that appears on the left-hand margin of the corresponding entry in the Works Cited List.
In-Text Citations: Author-Page Style
MLA format follows the author-page method of in-text citation. This means that the author's last name and the page
number(s) from which the quotation or paraphrase is taken must appear in the text, and a complete reference should appear
on your Works Cited page. The author's name may appear either in the sentence itself or in parentheses following the
quotation or paraphrase, but the page number(s) should always appear in the parentheses, not in the text of your sentence.
For example:
Wordsworth stated that Romantic poetry was marked by a "spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings" (263).

Romantic poetry is characterized by the "spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings" (Wordsworth 263).

Wordsworth extensively explored the role of emotion in the creative process (263).

Both citations in the examples above, (263) and (Wordsworth 263), tell readers that the information in the sentence can be
located on page 263 of a work by an author named Wordsworth. If readers want more information about this source, they
can turn to the Works Cited page, where, under the name of Wordsworth, they would find the following information:
Wordsworth, William. Lyrical Ballads. London: Oxford U.P., 1967. Print.

In-text Citations for Print Sources with Known Author

For Print sources like books, magazines, scholarly journal articles, and newspapers, provide a signal word or phrase
(usually the authors last name) and a page number. If you provide the signal word/phrase in the sentence, you do not need
to include it in the parenthetical citation.
Human beings have been described by Kenneth Burke as "symbol-using animals" (3). Human beings have been
described as "symbol-using animals" (Burke 3).

These examples must correspond to an entry that begins with Burke, which will be the first thing that appears on the lefthand margin of an entry in the Works Cited:

Burke, Kenneth. Language as Symbolic Action: Essays on Life, Literature, and Method. Berkeley: U of California
P, 1966. Print.

In-text Citations for Print Sources with No Known Author

When a source has no known author, use a shortened title of the work instead of an author name. Place the title in quotation
marks if it's a short work (e.g. articles) or italicize it if it's a longer work (e.g. plays, books, television shows, entire
websites) and provide a page number.
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).

In this example, since the reader does not know the author of the article, an abbreviated title of the article appears in the
parenthetical citation which corresponds to the full name of the article which appears first at the left-hand margin of its
respective entry in the Works Cited. Thus, the writer includes the title in quotation marks as the signal phrase in the
parenthetical citation in order to lead the reader directly to the source on the Works Cited page. The Works Cited entry
appears as follows:
The Impact of Global Warming in North America. GLOBAL WARMING: Early Signs. 1999. Web. 23 Mar. 2009.

We'll learn how to make a Works Cited page in a bit, but right now it's important to know that parenthetical citations and
Works Cited pages allow readers to know which sources you consulted in writing your essay, so that they can either verify
your interpretation of the sources or use them in their own scholarly work.
Author-Page Citation for Classic and Literary Works with Multiple Editions
Page numbers are always required, but additional citation information can help literary scholars, who may have a different
edition of a classic work like Marx and Engels's The Communist Manifesto. In such cases, give the page number of your
edition (making sure the edition is listed in your Works Cited page, of course) followed by a semicolon, and then the
appropriate abbreviations for volume (vol.), book (bk.), part (pt.), chapter (ch.), section (sec.), or paragraph (par.). For
example:
Marx and Engels described human history as marked by class struggles (79; ch. 1).

Citing Authors with Same Last Names

Sometimes more information is necessary to identify the source from which a quotation is taken. For instance, if two or
more authors have the same last name, provide both authors' first initials (or even the authors' full name if different authors
share initials) in your citation. For example:
Although some medical ethicists claim that cloning will lead to designer children (R. Miller 12), others note that
the advantages for medical research outweigh this consideration (A. Miller 46).

Citing a Work by Multiple Authors

For a source with three or fewer authors, list the authors' last names in the text or in the parenthetical citation:
Smith, Yang, and Moore argue that tougher gun control is not needed in the United States (76).

The authors state "Tighter gun control in the United States erodes Second Amendment rights" (Smith, Yang, and
Moore 76).

For a source with more than three authors, use the work's bibliographic information as a guide for your citation. Provide the
first author's last name followed by et al. or list all the last names.
Jones et al. counter Smith, Yang, and Moore's argument by noting that the current spike in gun violence in
America compels law makers to adjust gun laws (4).

Or
Legal experts counter Smith, Yang, and Moore's argument by noting that the current spike in gun violence in
America compels law makers to adjust gun laws (Jones et al. 4).

Or
Jones, Driscoll, Ackerson, and Bell counter Smith, Yang, and Moore's argument by noting that the current spike in
gun violence in America compels law makers to adjust gun laws (4).

Citing Multiple Works by the Same Author

If you cite more than one work by a particular author, include a shortened title for the particular work from which you are
quoting to distinguish it from the others. Put short titles of books in italics and short titles of articles in quotation marks.
Citing two articles by the same author:
Lightenor has argued that computers are not useful tools for small children ("Too Soon" 38), though he has
acknowledged elsewhere that early exposure to computer games does lead to better small motor skill development
in a child's second and third year ("Hand-Eye Development" 17).

Citing two books by the same author:

Murray states that writing is "a process" that "varies with our thinking style" (Write to Learn 6). Additionally,
Murray argues that the purpose of writing is to "carry ideas and information from the mind of one person into the
mind of another" (A Writer Teaches Writing 3).

Additionally, if the author's name is not mentioned in the sentence, you would format your citation with the author's name
followed by a comma, followed by a shortened title of the work, followed, when appropriate, by page numbers:
Visual studies, because it is such a new discipline, may be "too easy" (Elkins, "Visual Studies" 63).

Citing Multivolume Works

If you cite from different volumes of a multivolume work, always include the volume number followed by a colon. Put a
space after the colon, then provide the page number(s). (If you only cite from one volume, provide only the page number in
parentheses.)
. . . as Quintilian wrote in Institutio Oratoria (1: 14-17).

Citing the Bible

In your first parenthetical citation, you want to make clear which Bible you're using (and underline or italicize the title), as
each version varies in its translation, followed by book (do not italicize or underline), chapter and verse. For example:
Ezekiel saw "what seemed to be four living creatures," each with faces of a man, a lion, an ox, and an eagle (New
Jerusalem Bible, Ezek. 1.5-10).

If future references employ the same edition of the Bible youre using, list only the book, chapter, and verse in the
parenthetical citation.
Citing Indirect Sources
Sometimes you may have to use an indirect source. An indirect source is a source cited in another source. For such indirect
quotations, use "qtd. in" to indicate the source you actually consulted. For example:
Ravitch argues that high schools are pressured to act as "social service centers, and they don't do that well" (qtd. in
Weisman 259).

Note that, in most cases, a responsible researcher will attempt to find the original source, rather than citing an indirect
source.
Citing Non-Print or Sources from the Internet
With more and more scholarly work being posted on the Internet, you may have to cite research you have completed in
virtual environments. While many sources on the Internet should not be used for scholarly work (reference the OWL's
Evaluating Sources of Information resource), some Web sources are perfectly acceptable for research. When creating in-text
citations for electronic, film, or Internet sources, remember that your citation must reference the source in your Works
Cited.

Sometimes writers are confused with how to craft parenthetical citations for electronic sources because of the absence of
page numbers, but often, these sorts of entries do not require any sort of parenthetical citation at all. For electronic and
Internet sources, follow the following guidelines:
Include in the text the first item that appears in the Work Cited entry that corresponds to the citation (e.g. author
name, article name, website name, film name).
You do not need to give paragraph numbers or page numbers based on your Web browsers print preview function.
Unless you must list the website name in the signal phrase in order to get the reader to the appropriate entry, do not
include URLs in-text. Only provide partial URLs such as when the name of the site includes, for example, a
domain name, like CNN.com or Forbes.com as opposed to writing out http://www.cnn.com or
http://www.forbes.com.
Miscellaneous Non-Print Sources
Werner Herzog's Fitzcarraldo stars Herzog's long-time film partner, Klaus Kinski. During the shooting of
Fitzcarraldo, Herzog and Kinski were often at odds, but their explosive relationship fostered a memorable and
influential film.

During the presentation, Jane Yates stated that invention and pre-writing are areas of rhetoric that need more
attention.

In the two examples above Herzog from the first entry and Yates from the second lead the reader to the first item each
citations respective entry on the Works Cited page:
Herzog, Werner, dir. Fitzcarraldo. Perf. Klaus Kinski. Filmverlag der Autoren, 1982. Film.

Yates, Jane. "Invention in Rhetoric and Composition." Gaps Addressed: Future Work in Rhetoric and
Composition, CCCC, Palmer House Hilton, 2002. Presentation.

Electronic Sources
One online film critic stated that Fitzcarraldo is "...a beautiful and terrifying critique of obsession and
colonialism" (Garcia, Herzog: a Life).

The Purdue OWL is accessed by millions of users every year. Its MLA Formatting and Style Guide is one of the
most popular resources (Stolley et al.).

In the first example, the writer has chosen not to include the author name in-text; however, two entries from the same
author appear in the Works Cited. Thus, the writer includes both the authors last name and the article title in the
parenthetical citation in order to lead the reader to the appropriate entry on the Works Cited page (see below). In the second
example, Stolley et al. in the parenthetical citation gives the reader an author name followed by the abbreviation et al.,

meaning, and others, for the article MLA Formatting and Style Guide. Both corresponding Works Cited entries are as
follows:
Garcia, Elizabeth. "Herzog: a Life." Online Film Critics Corner. The Film School of New Hampshire, 2 May
2002. Web. 8 Jan. 2009.

Stolley, Karl. "MLA Formatting and Style Guide." The OWL at Purdue. 10 May 2006. Purdue University Writing
Lab. 12 May 2006 .

Multiple Citations
To cite multiple sources in the same parenthetical reference, separate the citations by a semi-colon:
. . . as has been discussed elsewhere (Burke 3; Dewey 21).

When a Citation Is Not Needed

Common sense and ethics should determine your need for documenting sources. You do not need to give sources for
familiar proverbs, well-known quotations or common knowledge. Remember, this is a rhetorical choice, based on audience.
If you're writing for an expert audience of a scholarly journal, for example, they'll have different expectations of what
constitutes common knowledge.