Preparing a List of Works Cited

Mohawk Guide to Citing Sources: Preparing a List of Works Cited (Spring 2010 Edition)

Why is it important to cite your sources? When you conduct research, you use information from a variety of sources. It is your responsibility to give credit to those sources. To use someone else's ideas or information in your writing without acknowledging the source is to plagiarize. When you claim someone else’s ideas or language as your own, without giving them credit, you are plagiarizing their work. When you use someone else’s ideas, you have two important responsibilities: (1) you must indicate your source and (2) explain what you used from it. The first part, identifying the sources you used in your research, involves providing a complete list of the sources you used. This is the Works Cited page of your paper. Your Works Cited list should be alphabetically organized by author's last name, like a phone book. If the author of a work is not known, place it alphabetically by the first piece of information you do have, which might be the title. When you write you bring together information from a variety of sources, using ideas or facts from here and there and incorporating them into your work. Therefore you have a second task: as you write you must indicate where an idea or information came from as you use it in your writing. This gives credit to the source and provides specific information so that your reader could locate precisely where you found it. Parenthetical citation is a common way to provide credit in the text; place the author’s last name and the page number in parentheses after the quotation or reference. Your reader can use this brief information to get the complete details about the source by referring to your Works Cited list. Use this style sheet as a guide to help you prepare your Works Cited list and document your sources properly. There are many variables (such as the number of authors, type of source, etc.); this guide provides you with the most common formats but you will sometimes need to seek additional information about how to properly format a source. Parenthetical Citation, also known as In-Text Citation To give credit to the source of information in your paper, immediately follow the quotation or paraphrasing of the source’s ideas by placing the author’s name followed by a space and the relevant page number. Pay attention to the location of the parentheses and the punctuation. For example: When you With a few exceptions, most of the world’s writing systems appear to be paraphrase: derived from Sumerian or Mesoamerican writing (Diamond 224). When you quote: “With the possible exception of the Egyptian, Chinese, and Easter Island writing to be considered later, all other writing systems devised anywhere in the world, at any time, appear to have been descendants of systems modified from or at least inspired by Sumerian or early Mesoamerican writing” (Diamond 224). Your parenthetical citation will correspond with an entry in your Works Cited page, which, for the citations above, will look like this: Diamond, Jared. Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1998. When a source has no known author, use a shortened title of the work instead of an author name. Multiple Citations To cite multiple sources in the same parenthetical reference, separate the citations by a semicolon: ...as has been discussed elsewhere (Diamond 12; Golden 235). A citation is not needed for familiar proverbs, well-known quotations or common knowledge. This handout was prepared by Mohawk Trail Regional School staff in February 2010 using materials derived from The OWL at Purdue University website. Mohawk Guide to Citing Sources: Preparing a List of Works Cited (Spring 2010 Edition)

Guide to Preparing a List of Works Cited Bear in mind that the purpose of providing a list of Works Cited is to give credit to your sources and provide information so that someone else could access the source you used. Because material on the Internet is constantly being updated, it is very important that you indicate when you accessed the site. Use this guide to help you properly cite your sources.

Material for this handout is derived from the The OWL at Purdue website: Purdue OWL. "MLA Formatting and Style Guide." The Purdue OWL. Purdue U Writing Lab, 10 May 2008. Web. 24 February 2010.

According to revisions to the Modern Language Association (MLA) Style Guide in 2009, writers are no longer required to provide URLs for Web entries. MLA no longer requires the use of URLs in MLA citations because Web addresses are not static (i.e. they change often) and because documents sometimes appear in multiple places on the Web (e.g. on multiple databases). MLA explains that most readers can find electronic sources via title or author searches in Internet Search Engines. For every entry, you must determine the Medium of Publication. Most entries will likely be listed as Print or Web sources, but other possibilities may include Film, CD- ROM, or DVD.

 You may not be able to find all of this information, such as the author and date the webpage was revised; if you can’t find that information leave it out.

What do you The general elements: What An actual example: What does it look want to cite? elements should you include like for an actual entry using a real and in what order? source? An entire Name of Site. Date of The Purdue OWL Family of Sites. 26 Aug. website Posting/Revision. Name of 2005. The Writing Lab and OWL at institution/organization Purdue and Purdue University. Accessed affiliated with the site on 23 April 2006. (sometimes found in copyright . statements). Date you accessed the site. . A page on a Author’s last name, first name. Krishnamurti, Indra. “History of Railways in website “Title of the page.” Title of the Indonesia.” Kereta Api Indonesia - Make sure the website. Date the page was Indonesian Railway. 30 December 2004. URL points to modified. Name of Accessed on 9 September 2006. the exact page institution/organization . you are referring affiliated with the site Halsall, Paul. “Introduction.” Byzantium: to. It’s possible (sometimes found in copyright Byzantine Studies on the Internet. 22 that you won’t statements). Date you accessed March 2004. Accessed on 12 September be able to find it. . 2006. all the . listed. An image,  Cite images as you would any Goya, Francisco. The Family of Charles IV. including a other Web page, but make sure 1800. Museo del Prado, Madrid. Accessed photograph, you're crediting the original creator on 22 May 2006. painting or of the image. If you do a Google . map found images search, you will want to “All Relatives, All Different: Panel 1.” All Of This handout was prepared by Mohawk Trail Regional School staff in February 2010 using materials derived from The OWL at Purdue University website. Mohawk Guide to Citing Sources: Preparing a List of Works Cited (Spring 2010 Edition) online follow the links to the actual Us Are Related, Each Of Us Is Unique webpage where the picture Exhibit. Syracuse University. 2002. appeared. In some cases you may Accessed on 20 April 2008. need to give an image an . provided on the Web page. “Map of East Africa.” Rhino Africa Safaris. 2007. Accessed on 20 April 2008. . Long URLs Notes: For example, the Amazon.com URL for URLs that Some Web sites have unusually customer privacy and security information is won't fit on long URLs that would be virtually , your Works frames, so the URL appears the so you need to simplify the citation: Cited list same for each page. To address this should be problem, either refer to a site's Amazon.com. "Privacy and Security." broken at search URL, or provide the path to Accessed on 22 May 2006. slashes, the resource from an entry page . Path: Help; when with an easier URL. Begin the path Privacy & Security. possible. with the word Path followed by a colon, followed by the name of each link, separated by a semicolon. An article in an Author(s). "Title of Article." Title Bernstein, Mark. "10 Tips on Writing The online of Online Publication. Date of Living Web." A List Apart: For People publication, Publication. Date of Access Who Make Websites. No. 149 (16 Aug. including news . 2002). Accessed on 4 May 2006. sites . An article in an Author. "Title of Article." Hosenball, Mark. "North Korea and Iraq: online database Periodical Name Volume Trumped-up Threats?" Newsweek. 3 July Number (if necessary) 2006: 11. InfoTrac Student Edition. Publication Date: page number- Mohawk Trail Regional School Resource page number. Database name. Center. Shelburne Falls, MA: Accessed Service name. Library Name, on 11 July 2006. . City, State. Date of access . A book by a Author’s last name, first name. Kurlansky, Mark. Salt: A World History. single author Title. City where it was New York: Penguin Books, 2002. published: Publishing company, year. A book with Author’s last name, first name, and Marquart, James W., Sheldon Ekland Olson, two or three author’s first and last name. and Jonathan R. Sorensen. The Rope, the authors Title. City where it was Chair, and the Needle: Capital published: Publishing company, Punishment in Texas, 1923-1990. Austin: year. U. of Texas Publishing, 1994. A book with Author’s last name, first name, et al. Miller, James E., Jr. et al. United States in four or more Title. City where it was Literature. Medallion Edition. Glenview, authors (use published: Publishing company, IL: Scott, Foresman and Company, 1982. the Latin term et year. al [meaning “and others”] for the others): This handout was prepared by Mohawk Trail Regional School staff in February 2010 using materials derived from The OWL at Purdue University website. Mohawk Guide to Citing Sources: Preparing a List of Works Cited (Spring 2010 Edition)

A book with an Editor’s last name, first name, ed. Boorstin, Daniel J., ed. An American Primer. editor Title. City where it was Chicago: University of Chicago Press, published: Publishing company, 1968. year. An article in a “Title of the entry.” Title of the "Thailand." Encyclopedia Britannica. 1999 reference book reference book. Year ed. ed. An essay or Author’s last name, first name. Jen, Gish. “In the American Society.” Hear story in a “Title of the essay or story.” My Voice: A multicultural anthology of collection Title of the book in which it literature from the United States. Ed. appears. Editor of the book. Laurie King. Menlo Park, CA: Addison- City: Publisher, year: page Wesley Publishing Co., 1994:174-187. numbers. An article in a Author’s last name, first name. Drape, Joe. "High School Football, Under newspaper “Title of the article.” Name of Prime-Time Lights." New York Times. newspaper. Date: page numbers. 17 September 2006: A1 and A10. An article in a Author’s last name, first name. Mitchell, John G. “Autumn in Acadia magazine “Title of the article.” Name of National Park.” National Geographic magazine. Date: page numbers. November 2005: 28-45. An interview Last name, first name of person Beck, Brian. Personal interview. 7 you conducted interviewed. Personal interview. September 2006. Date. A film or Title of the film. Director’s name. Raisin in the Sun. Dir. Daniel Petrie. With video/DVD Name of key actors. Film Sidney Poitier, Claudia McNeil, and company, year. Ruby Dee. Columbia Pictures, 1961. An article in a “Title of the entry.” Name of CD- "World War II." Encarta. CD-ROM. Seattle: reference ROM. CD-ROM. City, Microsoft, 1999. database on Company that produced it, year. CD-ROM A pamphlet Title of the pamphlet. City: Women's Health: Problems of the Digestive Organization that produced it, System. Washington: American College year. of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, 2006.

What does a properly formatted Works Cited list look like?

Alphabetize by author’s last name. For works with no author listed, alphabetize by title.

Works Cited

"Business Coalition for Climate Action Doubles." Environmental Defense. 8 May 2007. Environmental Defense Organization. Accessed on 24 May 2007. .

Dean, Cornelia. "Executive on a Mission: Saving the Planet." New York Times. 22 May 2007. Accessed on 25 May 2007. .

Gowdy, John. "Avoiding Self-organized Extinction: Toward a Co-evolutionary Economics of Sustainability." International Journal of Sustainable Development and World Ecology 14.1 (2007): 27-36.

This handout was prepared by Mohawk Trail Regional School staff in February 2010 using materials derived from The OWL at Purdue University website.