MLA Referencing

Posted: October 24, 2023
To: Essay Writing

The MLA, Modern languages Association of America style, is most commonly used in humanities subjects such as English and Philosophy. There have been several editions available, that have come out with different ways of referencing text. This guide will refer to the 8^th edition, but you may want to check with your syllabus and your professors before you start referencing using MLA.

In text citations

When referencing using the MLA system in text, the author surname and the page number will be added in brackets after the information is used in your essay. This can be done in any of the following ways:

Distance learning has been shown to be very effective for certain students (Anderson 45)

In Anderson’s book The Importance Of Distance Learning (Anderson 45), he shares the research done that shows that some students perform much better in distance learning settings for other than the classroom.

In certain studies (Anderson 45), It has been seen that certain groups of students will perform better when they are not learning in a traditional classroom setting.

Reference list citations

There are several different documents that you may use as source is during your essay writing, if you’re using the MLA system. Here are some of the most common sources you may use, and how you may reference them in your reference list.

Books

When referencing a book, adding in the reference at the end is fairly simple. It should be laid out like so:

Author surname, first name. Title of book. Publisher, year.

So with a book in your reference list, the reference will look like this:

Anderson, James. The Importance Of Distance Learning. Harper Collin, 2005.

Edited books and chapters

You’ll also commonly use edited books or chapters from edited books when your referencing your essay in this style. The layouts of a reference for such a book will look like this:

Editor surname, first name, ed. Title of book. Publisher, year.

So when referencing an edited book it will look something like this:

Cauldwell, Amy, ed. Early Years Education. Harper Collin, 2005.

Journal articles

Again journal articles will commonly be used in MLA referenced essays. There are two different ways to reference a journal article in MLA, depending on whether you’re using an electronic copy or a journal print copy. If you are referencing a print copy, the layout will look like this:

Author surname, first name. “Title of article”. Name of journal, volume #, no. #, year of publication: pp: # - #

As such, when referencing a print journal it will look like this:

Anderson, James. “The Importance Of Distance Learning”. Early Years Education, vol. 34, no. 2, 2005: pp: 45 – 56

If you are looking to reference and electronic journal, then the reference system will be very slightly different. It is worth noting if there is both a physical and electronic version of the same journal, then you will need to reference it using the print version, even if you use the electronic version. The reference for an electronic journal will look like so:

Author surname, first name. “Title of article”. Name of journal, vol. #, no. #, year: pp: #-#. <URL> accessed day, month, year.

With this system your reference will now look like this:

Anderson, James. “The Importance Of Distance Learning”. Early Years Education, vol. 34, no. 2, 2005: pp: 45 – 56. <www.onlinelibrary.com/doi/114/111> Accessed 12^th April 2023.

Newspaper articles

Newspaper articles are common source when using the MLA referencing system. Like journal articles, there are different ways to reference them to pending whether there is an author listed or not. Firstly, let’s take a look at referencing an article with an author listed. This is how the reference should be laid out in your reference list:

Author surname, first name. “Title of article”. Name of newspaper. Day, month, year: pp: #-#

So as an example your reference will look like this:

Anderson, James. “The Importance Of Distance Learning”. Guardian. 22^nd March 2005: pp: 34-35

If there isn’t an author listed for your article, it can still be referenced in your reference list. The layout for this reference will look like so:

“Title of article”. Editorial. Name of newspaper. Day, month, year: pp. #-#

So if you have an article that doesn’t have an author it will be referenced like so:

“The Importance Of Long Distance Learning”. Editorial. Guardian. 22^nd March 2005: pp: 34-35

There’s also a way of referencing newspaper articles, if they are only available online. These references are laid out like so:

Author surname, first name. “Title of article”. Name of newspaper. Day, month, year. <URL> Accessed day, month, year.

So with this layout, your reference will look like such:

Anderson, James. “The Importance Of Distance Learning”. Guardian. 22^nd March 2005. <www.theguardian.com/importance-of-online-learning>. Accessed 12^th April 2023.

Websites

Finally, websites are another common reference that you will use in essays that use the MLA format. Again, there will be different ways of referencing the website depending on whether there is an author listed or not. Firstly, let’s look at referencing a website with an author. The layout of the reference should look like this:

Author surname, first name. “Title of specific webpage”. Name of overall website, day, month, year. Web. URL Accessed day month year.

So in this instance, your reference should look like this:

Anderson, James. “The Importance Of Distance Learning”. Early Years Education, 22^nd March 2005. Web. www.earlyyearseducation.com, accessed 12^th April 2023.

If there is no author listed for the web page you’re using, it can still be referenced in your reference list. The layout for this reference will look like so:

Organisation. “Title of specific webpage”. Name of overall website. Day, month, year. Web. URL Accessed day, month, year.

As such, your reference should look like this:

University of Birmingham. “The Importance Of Distance Learning”. Early Years Education, 22^nd March 2005. Web. www.earlyyearseducation.com, accessed 12^th April 2023.