MLA Style

MLA style is generally instrumental in the field of humanities and liberal arts for citing sources and writing papers. The MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers (7^th Edition) and the MLA Manual and Guide to Scholarly Publishing contain all resources required in using MLA style. These guidelines are used to cite sources in all literary and scholarly magazines, newsletters, journals among other presses.

Click here to view MLA style samples.

Generally, MLA style is characterized by citations of brief parenthesis in the particular text basing on the sources listed on the last page of the document (bibliography).

MLA style citations help in avoiding plagiarized work thus, indicating the responsibility of writers in handling their pieces of writing.

In-text MLA Citations

The in-text citations, basically meant to direct the reader to the source of the writer’s information, should be brief, complementary and clear. This consists of the last name of the author and page number.

Bibliography

This must provide a comprehensible list of all works cited in the document; alphabetically arranged using the surnames of the authors or the title of the document in case the author’s name is not provided.

MLA style consists of white 8.5 by 11 inch and double spaced document with a comprehensible font preferably Times New Roman of 12 ppt. Single spacing is preferred after periods and other punctuation marks. Document margins should be 1 inch from all sides. The first paragraph line should be indented half-inch on the left margin. The page numbers should be on the right-hand side, a half-inch from the top and a flush at the right-hand margin.

Long titles should be italicized if used. In case endnotes are used, they should be included on a different page before the page containing cited works. Title pages should not be used unless asked to do so.

The upper hand corner of the first page should have a list of: writer’s name, instructor’s name, the course, and date. The title should be centered and in Title Case. It should not be underlined, italicized or placed in quotation marks. All pages should be numbered consecutively in Arabic numerical.

MLA style guidelines require the use of block quotation format in cases where the quotation is more than four lines long. It is recommended that a colon should be used in introducing the quotation; the quotation should be double-spaced; quotation marks should not used.