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Environmental Science and Studies

Modern Language Association (MLA) Style

MLA style is most commonly used to write papers and cite sources within the liberal arts and humanities. These resources offer examples for the general format of MLA research papers, in-text citations, endnotes/footnotes, and the Works Cited page. 

Use the link below to access the MLA Handbook Plus on or off campus.

Most library databases will format citations in MLA format for you:

►On the database record for a book or article, look for links to Cite or Cite/Export.
Choose MLA, then cut & paste the formatted citation into your document.

Or, use a reference management tool such as Zotero to create a database of your sources & automatically format citations.

Quick Examples: Works Cited List

Books:

Peters, Clinton Crockett. Pandora's Garden: Kudzu, Cockroaches, and Other Misfits of Ecology. University of Georgia, 2018.

Periodicals (journal, magazine, newspaper):

Bucher, Christina. “Perversely Reading Kate Chopin’s ‘Fedora.’” Mississippi Quarterly: The Journal of Southern Cultures, vol. 51, no. 2, Summer 2003, pp. 373-388.

Quick Examples: In-text Citations

MLA format follows the author-page method of in-text citation - the author's last name and the page number from which the quotation or paraphrase is taken must appear in the text, either in the sentence itself or in parentheses following the quotation or paraphrase. The page number(s) should always appear in the parentheses, not in the text of your sentence. For example:

Davidson calls Meek's poems "weighted with love of world and word" (113).

What she delivers is a balance in language that is all but incandescent. Biogeography is an extraordinary achievement (Davidson 112).

Here's how the companion Works Cited entry for the source above would be formatted:

Davidson, Phebe. "Keepers: A Review of Adcock, Meek, Kennedy and Blakely." Asheville Poetry Review, vol.16, no.1, 2009, pp.110-113.

Learn How to Use MLA Style

Websites on MLA Style