Why Cite?

We cite to tell our audience that the information, ideas, or words came from another source. You give credit to the author/creator and avoid plagiarism. The citation also tells your audience where to find the original source. All sources must be cited.

What is a source?

A source is a person/place/thing where you get the information to use for your project/paper/presentation. Your source might be a book, website, database article, interview, Youtube video, or something else. MLA 8 describes these sources as containers. 

What is a Works Cited page?

In MLA8 format, the reference list is usually titled the ‘Works-Cited List’. This is a list of all the sources referenced within the document and contains the author's name, source title, date of publication and more information which varies depending on the source type.  See Guidelines. 
Here are eight quick rules for this list:
  1. Start a new page for your Works Cited list (e.g., if your paper is 4 pages long, start your Works Cited list on page 5).
  2. Centre the title, Works Cited, at the top of the page and do not bold or underline it. Look for the alignment option in Word:
  3. Double-space the list.
  4. Start the first line of each citation at the left margin; each subsequent line should be indented (also known as a "hanging indent").
  5. Put your list in alphabetical order. Alphabetize the list by the first word in the citation. In most cases, the first word will be the author’s last name. Where the author is unknown, alphabetize by the first word in the title, ignoring the words a, an, the.
  6. For each author, give the last name followed by a comma and the first name followed by a period.
  7. Italicize the titles of full works: books, audiovisual material,websites.
  8. Do not italicize titles of parts of works, such as: articles from newspapers, magazines, or journals / essays, poems, short stories or chapter titles from a book / chapters or sections of an Internet document. Instead, use quotation marks.

What is a citation?

A citation identifies the creator of the information as well as the necessary information to enable a reader to find that source. 

How do I create a citation?

This MLA poster shows the basics of MLA Citation. 

​This Quick Guide from MLA walks you through the basics of creating a citation.

HOW TO CITE with examples

This LibGuide presents in depth instructions with examples to help you cite a variety of resources.

It also provides templates for a Sample Works Cited List and a Sample Paper

See Some Examples