The following information is an abridged version of the style and formatting guidelines found in the Publication Manual of the MLA Handbook, 9th ed. (2021). This sheet is to serve as a ready reference; more in-depth descriptions can be found in the handbook.
Basic Information for In-Text Citations
In-text citations are references within the text of your paper to source material. Source material is text, either in print or on the Web, that you have chosen to include in your paper through directly quoting, paraphrasing, or summarizing. Whenever you use the words, facts, or ideas of someone else, in-text citations MUST be present. Following are some general guidelines regarding in-text citations.
- In-text citations provide essential information about the sources that you are referring to within your paper so your reader can easily find more detailed publication information about each source on the Works Cited page.
- The way a source is cited within your text should reflect the style in which it is cited within the Works Cited list.
- Whatever appears first in the Works Cited entry (author or title of the work if there is no author) is how the source is referred to within your in-text citation.
- In the absence of an author, the full title of the work (if brief) or an abbreviated form (beginning with the word by which it was alphabetized) should be included in the in-text citation.
- The author’s last name (or title of the work if there is no author) and the page number(s) on which you found the information are included within the in-text citation.
- If you use the author’s name within the sentence, then only the page number(s) go in the in the parentheses. This is referred to as a narrative in-text citation (rather than a parenthetical citation).
- If you refer to the same source more than once without referring to a different source in-between, then only the page number needs to appear within the parenthetical reference until another source is included.
- Punctuation is always placed outside of the in-text citation.
In-Text Citations According to Situation
A print source with one author
- The page number is not preceded by p. or pg. but appears alone within the parentheses.
- Example: Human beings have been described as “symbol-using animals” (Burke 3).
A print source with a co-author
- Example: Titanic’s speculated breakup during sinking was confirmed by Dr. Ballard, who noted a “complete separation” of the stern section during the first expedition (Raffel and Smith 7).
A print source with no author
- The title of the book appears italicized within the parentheses to reflect how it appears in the Works Cited list.
- Example: The authors define a university’s identity as a “purposeful presentation of itself in order to gain a positive image in the minds of the public” (Institutional Image 259).
A web source with an author
- The paragraph number is included for online sources in place of the page number if the original source includes paragraph numbers.
- Example: One online film critic stated that Fitzcarraldo is “…a beautiful and terrifying critique of obsession and colonialism” (Garcia 18).
A web source with no author
- The title of the book appears in quotation marks within the parentheses to reflect how it appears in the Works Cited list.
- Example: Clinton confronted inner-city issues in a way that “inspired members of the African American community rather than scorned them” (“Mr. Clinton’s”).
An Indirect Source
- When you are quoting or paraphrasing a passage spoken or written by one scholar or writer that is referred to within the work of another scholar or writer (an indirect source), include the original author’s name in the text and cite the author of the indirect source as “qtd. in” within the parenthetical citation. By crediting both the original author and the author of the indirect source, the reader can easily locate the quoted passage and you protect yourself in case the original author was misquoted. While the original source should always be used when available, quoting or paraphrasing the indirect source is acceptable.
- Only the indirect source citation appears in the Works Cited—this is the source from which you access the quoted material, not the original source quoted by the author of the research you have cited for your purposes.
- Here is an example, in which Fitzgerald is the original author of the quotation and Mallios is the author of the indirect source.
- Example: Fitzgerald describes the state of American fiction by explaining that “[e]ver since Irving’s preoccupation with necessity for an American background, for some miles of clear territory on which colorful variants might pleasantly arise, the question of material has hampered the American writer” (qtd. in Mallios 360).
- Note: Only the indirect source citation appears in the Works Cited—this is the source from which you access the quoted material, not the original source quoted by the author of the research you have cited for your purposes.
A play
- Quotations and paraphrases from plays are parenthetically cited based on textual division (such as act, scene, book, and/or part).
- Numbers are usually written in Arabic numerals for acts and scenes.
- Example: (5.165) refers to Act 5, line 165 of a play.
- If your quotation contains more than one line from the poem or play use forward slashes (/) between each line of the poem and use a double forward slash (//) to indicate line breaks that occur between stanzas.
Example Quoting Three Lines of Verse or Less
For instance, at the beginning of the play, Theseus sends the plot into motion when he, who has the power to allow the couples to marry for love, gives Hermia a day to decide her fate, “either [dying] the death or… [abjuring]/ Forever the society of men” (Shakespeare 1.1.67-68).
Basic Information for Block Quotations
- When using direct quotations that are more than four lines of prose or three lines of verse, they should be formatted as block quotes.
- Following an introductory phrase, the entire quote should:
- Start on a new line
- Not have quotation marks surrounding it
- Be indented ½ inches from the left margin
- End with a parenthetical citation following the quote’s ending punctuation
Example Prose Block Quotation
Near the end of Caleb Williams, the title character attempts to convince himself that the events and characters surrounding him are not supernatural after all:
Mr. Falkland, wise as he is and pregnant in resources, acts by human not by supernatural means. He may overtake me by surprise, and in a manner of which I had no previous expectation; but he cannot produce a great and notorious effect without some visible agency, however difficult it may be to trace that agency to its absolute author. He cannot … shroud himself in clouds and impenetrable darkness, and scatter destruction upon the earth from his secret habitation. (Godwin 306)
Example Verse Block Quotation
In “Revelation,” Robert Frost illustrates the way in which we see the world:
We make ourselves a place apart
Behind light words that tease and flout,
But oh, the agitated hear
Till someone really find us out. (1-4)