Mla format persuasive essay

General Guidelines * Type your paper on a computer and print it out on standard, white 8. 5 x 11-inch paper. * Double-space the text of your paper, and use a legible font (e. g. Times New Roman). Whatever font you choose, MLA recommends that the regular and italics type styles contrast enough that they are recognizable one from another. The font size should be 12 pt. * Leave only one space after periods or other punctuation marks (unless otherwise instructed by your instructor). * Set the margins of your document to 1 inch on all sides. Indent the first line of paragraphs one half-inch from the left margin. MLA recommends that you use the Tab key as opposed to pushing the Space Bar five times. * Create a header that numbers all pages consecutively in the upper right-hand corner, one-half inch from the top and flush with the right margin. (Note: Your instructor may ask that you omit the number on your first page. Always follow your instructor’s guidelines. ) * Use italics throughout your essay for the titles of longer works and, only when absolutely necessary, providing emphasis. If you have any endnotes, include them on a separate page before your Works Cited page. Entitle the section Notes (centered, unformatted). Formatting the First Page of Your Paper * Do not make a title page for your paper unless specifically requested. * In the upper left-hand corner of the first page, list your name, your instructor’s name, the course, and the date. Again, be sure to use double-spaced text. * Double space again and center the title. Do not underline, italicize, or place your title in quotation marks; write the title in Title Case (standard capitalization), not in all capital letters. Use quotation marks and/or italics when referring to other works in your title, just as you would in your text: Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas as Morality Play; Human Weariness in ” After Apple Picking” * Double space between the title and the first line of the text. * Create a header in the upper right-hand corner that includes your last name, followed by a space with a page number; number all pages consecutively with Arabic numerals (1, 2, 3, 4, etc. ), one-half inch from the top and flush with the right margin. Note: Your instructor or other readers may ask that you omit last name/page number header on your first page. Always follow instructor guidelines. ) Here is a sample of the first page of a paper in MLA style: Image Caption: The First Page of an MLA Paper Basic In-Text Citation Rules In MLA style, referring to the works of others in your text is done by using what is known as parenthetical citation. This method involves placing relevant source information in parentheses after a quote or a paraphrase. General Guidelines * The source information required in a parenthetical citation depends (1. upon the source medium (e. g. Print, Web, DVD) and (2. ) upon the source’s entry on the Works Cited (bibliography) page. * Any source information that you provide in-text must correspond to the source information on the Works Cited page. More specifically, whatever signal word or phrase you provide to your readers in the text, must be the first thing that appears on the left-hand margin of the corresponding entry in the Works Cited List. In-Text Citations: Author-Page Style MLA format follows the author-page method of in-text citation.

This means that the author’s last name and the page number(s) from which the quotation or paraphrase is taken must appear in the text, and a complete reference should appear on your Works Cited page. The author’s name may appear either in the sentence itself or in parentheses following the quotation or paraphrase, but the page number(s) should always appear in the parentheses, not in the text of your sentence. For example: Wordsworth stated that Romanticpoetrywas marked by a ” spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings” (263).

Romantic poetry is characterized by the ” spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings” (Wordsworth 263). Wordsworth extensively explored the role of emotion in the creative process (263). Both citations in the examples above, (263) and (Wordsworth 263), tell readers that the information in the sentence can be located on page 263 of a work by an author named Wordsworth. If readers want more information about this source, they can turn to the Works Cited page, where, under the name of Wordsworth, they would find the following information: Wordsworth, William.

Lyrical Ballads. London: Oxford U. P. , 1967. Print. In-text Citations for Print Sources with Known Author For Print sources like books, magazines, scholarly journal articles, and newspapers, provide a signal word or phrase (usually the author’s last name) and a page number. If you provide the signal word/phrase in the sentence, you do not need to include it in the parenthetical citation. Human beings have been described by Kenneth Burke as ” symbol-using animals” (3). Human beings have been described as ” symbol-using animals” (Burke 3).

These examples must correspond to an entry that begins with Burke, which will be the first thing that appears on the left-hand margin of an entry in the Works Cited: Burke, Kenneth. Language as Symbolic Action: Essays on Life, Literature, and Method. Berkeley: U of California P, 1966. Print. In-text Citations for Print Sources with No Known Author When a source has no known author, use a shortened title of the work instead of an author name. Place the title in quotation marks if it’s a short work (e. g. articles) or italicize it if it’s a longer work (e. g. lays, books, television shows, entire websites) and provide a page number. We see so manyglobal warminghotspots in North America likely because this region has “ more readily accessible climatic data and more comprehensive programs to monitor and study environmental change . . . ” (“ Impact of Global Warming” 6). In this example, since the reader does not know the author of the article, an abbreviated title of the article appears in the parenthetical citation which corresponds to the full name of the article which appears first at the left-hand margin of its respective entry in the Works Cited.

Thus, the writer includes the title in quotation marks as the signal phrase in the parenthetical citation in order to lead the reader directly to the source on the Works Cited page. The Works Cited entry appears as follows: “ The Impact of Global Warming in North America. ” GLOBAL WARMING: Early Signs. 1999. Web. 23 Mar. 2009. We’ll learn how to make a Works Cited page in a bit, but right now it’s important to know that parenthetical citations and Works Cited pages allow readers to know which sources you consulted in riting your essay, so that they can either verify your interpretation of the sources or use them in their own scholarly work. Author-Page Citation for Classic and Literary Works with Multiple Editions Page numbers are always required, but additional citation information can help literary scholars, who may have a different edition of a classic work like Marx and Engels’s The Communist Manifesto. In such cases, give the page number of your edition (making sure the edition is listed in your Works Cited page, of course) followed by a semicolon, and then the appropriate abbreviations for volume (vol. , book (bk. ), part (pt. ), chapter (ch. ), section (sec. ), or paragraph (par. ). For example: Marx and Engels described human history as marked by class struggles (79; ch. 1). Citing Authors with Same Last Names Sometimes more information is necessary to identify the source from which a quotation is taken. For instance, if two or more authors have the same last name, provide both authors’ first initials (or even the authors’ full name if different authors share initials) in your citation. For example: Although some medical ethicists claim that cloning will lead to designer children (R.

Miller 12), others note that the advantages for medical research outweigh this consideration (A. Miller 46). Citing a Work by Multiple Authors For a source with three or fewer authors, list the authors’ last names in the text or in the parenthetical citation: Smith, Yang, and Moore argue that toughergun controlis not needed in the United States (76). The authors state ” Tighter gun control in the United States erodes Second Amendment rights” (Smith, Yang, and Moore 76). For a source with more than three authors, use the work’s bibliographic information as a guide for your citation.

Provide the first author’s last name followed by et al. or list all the last names. Jones et al. counter Smith, Yang, and Moore’s argument by noting that the current spike ingun violencein America compels law makers to adjust gun laws (4). Or Legal experts counter Smith, Yang, and Moore’s argument by noting that the current spike in gunviolencein America compels law makers to adjust gun laws (Jones et al. 4). Or Jones, Driscoll, Ackerson, and Bell counter Smith, Yang, and Moore’s argument y noting that the current spike in gun violence in America compels law makers to adjust gun laws (4). Citing Multiple Works by the Same Author If you cite more than one work by a particular author, include a shortened title for the particular work from which you are quoting to distinguish it from the others. Lightenor has argued that computers are not useful tools for small children (” Too Soon” 38), though he has acknowledged elsewhere that early exposure to computer games does lead to better small motor skill development in a child’s second and third year (” Hand-Eye Development” 17).

Additionally, if the author’s name is not mentioned in the sentence, you would format your citation with the author’s name followed by a comma, followed by a shortened title of the work, followed, when appropriate, by page numbers: Visual studies, because it is such a new discipline, may be ” too easy” (Elkins, ” Visual Studies” 63). Citing Multivolume Works If you cite from different volumes of a multivolume work, always include the volume number followed by a colon. Put a space after the colon, then provide the page number(s). (If you only cite from one volume, provide only the page number in parentheses. . . . as Quintilian wrote in Institutio Oratoria (1: 14-17). Citing Indirect Sources Sometimes you may have to use an indirect source. An indirect source is a source cited in another source. For such indirect quotations, use ” qtd. in” to indicate the source you actually consulted. For example: Ravitch argues that high schools are pressured to act as ” social service centers, and they don’t do that well” (qtd. in Weisman 259). Note that, in most cases, a responsible researcher will attempt to find the original source, rather than citing an indirect source.

Citing Non-Print or Sources from the Internet With more and more scholarly work being posted on the Internet, you may have to cite research you have completed in virtual environments. While many sources on the Internet should not be used for scholarly work (reference the OWL’s Evaluating Sources of Information resource), some Web sources are perfectly acceptable for research. When creating in-text citations for electronic, film, or Internet sources, remember that your citation must reference the source in your Works Cited.

Sometimes writers are confused with how to craft parenthetical citations for electronic sources because of the absence of page numbers, but often, these sorts of entries do not require any sort of parenthetical citation at all. For electronic and Internet sources, follow the following guidelines: * Include in the text the first item that appears in the Work Cited entry that corresponds to the citation (e. g. author name, article name, website name, film name). * You do not need to give paragraph numbers or page numbers based on your Web browser’s print preview function. Unless you must list the website name in the signal phrase in order to get the reader to the appropriate entry, do not include URLs in-text. Only provide partial URLs such as when the name of the site includes, for example, a domain name, like CNN. com or Forbes. com as opposed to writing out http://www. cnn. com or http://www. forbes. com * Multiple Citations * To cite multiple sources in the same parenthetical reference, separate the citations by a semi-colon: * . . . as has been discussed elsewhere (Burke 3; Dewey 21). When a Citation Is Not Needed Common sense and ethics should determine your need for documenting sources.

You do not need to give sources for familiar proverbs, well-known quotations or common knowledge. Remember, this is a rhetorical choice, based on audience. If you’re writing for an expert audience of a scholarly journal, for example, they’ll have different expectations of what constitutes common knowledge. MLA Works Cited Page: Basic Format Summary: MLA (Modern Language Association) style is most commonly used to write papers and cite sources within the liberal arts and humanities. This resource, updated to reflect the MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers (7th ed. and the MLA Style Manual and Guide to Scholarly Publishing (3rd ed. ), offers examples for the general format of MLA research papers, in-text citations, endnotes/footnotes, and the Works Cited page. Contributors: Tony Russell, Allen Brizee, Elizabeth Angeli, Russell Keck Last Edited: 2010-07-13 12: 51: 47 According to MLA style, you must have a Works Cited page at the end of your research paper. All entries in the Works Cited page must correspond to the works cited in your main text. Basic Rules * Begin your Works Cited page on a separate page at the end of your research paper.

It should have the same one-inch margins and last name, page number header as the rest of your paper. * Label the page Works Cited (do not italicize the words Works Cited or put them in quotation marks) and center the words Works Cited at the top of the page. * Double space all citations, but do not skip spaces between entries. * Indent the second and subsequent lines of citations five spaces so that you create a hanging indent. * List page numbers of sources efficiently, when needed. If you refer to a journal article that appeared on pages 225 through 250, list the page numbers on your Works Cited page as 225-50.

Additional Basic Rules New to MLA 2009 * 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. * Writers are no longer required to provide URLs for Web entries. However, if your instructor or publisher insists on them, include them in angle brackets after the entry and end with a period. For long URLs, break lines only at slashes. * If you’re citing an article or a publication that was originally issued in print form but that you retrieved from an online database, you should type the online database name in italics.

You do not need to provide subscription information in addition to the database name. Capitalization and Punctuation * Capitalize each word in the titles of articles, books, etc, but do not capitalize articles (the, an), prepositions, or conjunctions unless one is the first word of the title or subtitle: Gone with the Wind, The Art of War, There Is Nothing Left to Lose. * New to MLA 2009: Use italics (instead of underlining) for titles of larger works (books, magazines) and quotation marks for titles of shorter works (poems, articles) Listing Author Names

Entries are listed alphabetically by the author’s last name (or, for entire edited collections, editor names). Author names are written last name first; middle names or middle initials follow the first name: Burke, Kenneth Levy, David M. Wallace, David Foster Do not list titles (Dr. , Sir, Saint, etc. ) or degrees (PhD, MA, DDS, etc. ) with names. A book listing an author named ” John Bigbrain, PhD” appears simply as ” Bigbrain, John”; do, however, include suffixes like ” Jr. ” or ” II. ” Putting it all together, a work by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. would be cited as ” King, Martin Luther, Jr. ” with the suffix following the first or middle name and a comma. More than One Work by an Author If you have cited more than one work by a particular author, order the entries alphabetically by title, and use three hyphens in place of the author’s name for every entry after the first: Burke, Kenneth. A Grammar of Motives. [… ] —. A Rhetoric of Motives. [… ] When an author or collection editor appears both as the sole author of a text and as the first author of a group, list solo-author entries first: Heller, Steven, ed. TheEducationof an E-Designer. ? Heller, Steven and Karen Pomeroy.

Design Literacy: Understanding Graphic Design. Work with No Known Author Alphabetize works with no known author by their title; use a shortened version of the title in the parenthetical citations in your paper. In this case, Boring Postcards USA has no known author: Baudrillard, Jean. Simulacra and Simulations. [… ] Boring Postcards USA. [… ] Burke, Kenneth. A Rhetoric of Motives. [… ] An Article from an Online Database (or Other Electronic Subscription Service) Cite articles from online databases (e. g. LexisNexis, ProQuest, JSTOR, ScienceDirect) and other subscription services just as you would print sources.

Since these articles usually come from periodicals, be sure to consult the appropriate sections of the Works Cited: Periodicals page, which you can access via its link at the bottom of this page. In addition to this information, provide the title of the database italicized, the medium of publication, and the date of access. Note: Previous editions of the MLA Style Manual required information about the subscribing institution (name and location). This information is no longer required by MLA. Junge, Wolfgang, and Nathan Nelson. “ Nature’s Rotary Electromotors. ” Science29 Apr. 2005: 642-44. Science Online. Web. 5 Mar. 2009.

Langhamer, Claire. “ Love and Courtship in Mid-Twentieth-Century England. ” Historical Journal 50. 1 (2007): 173-96. ProQuest. Web. 27 May 2009. Works Cited ” Blueprint Lays Out Clear Path for Climate Action. ” Environmental Defense Fund. Environmental Defense Fund, 8 May 2007. Web. 24 May 2009. Clinton, Bill. Interviewby Andrew C. Revkin. “ Clinton onClimate Change. ” New York Times. New York Times, May 2007. Web. 25 May 2009. Dean, Cornelia. ” Executive on a Mission: Saving the Planet. ” New York Times. New York Times, 22 May 2007. Web. 25 May 2009. Ebert, Roger. ” An Inconvenient Truth. ” Rev. of An Inconvenient Truth, dir.

Davis Guggenheim. Rogerebert. com. Sun-Times News Group, 2 June 2006. Web. 24 May 2009. GlobalWarming. org. Cooler HeadsCoalition, 2007. Web. 24 May 2009. 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. Print. An Inconvenient Truth. Dir. Davis Guggenheim. Perf. Al Gore, Billy West. Paramount, 2006. DVD. Leroux, Marcel. Global Warming: Myth Or Reality? : The Erring Ways of Climatology. New York: Springer, 2005. Print. Milken, Michael, Gary Becker, Myron Scholes, and Daniel Kahneman. On Global Warming and Financial Imbalances. ” New Perspectives Quarterly 23. 4 (2006): 63. Print Nordhaus, William D. ” After Kyoto: Alternative Mechanisms to Control Global Warming. ” American Economic Review 96. 2 (2006): 31-34. Print. —. ” Global Warming Economics. ” Science 9 Nov. 2001: 1283-84. Science Online. Web. 24 May 2009. Shulte, Bret. ” Putting a Price onPollution. ” Usnews. com. US News & World Rept. , 6 May 2007. Web. 24 May 2009. Uzawa, Hirofumi. Economic Theory and Global Warming. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2003. Print. The above is taken from: The Purdue OWL. Purdue U Writing Lab, 2010. Web. April 7, 2011.