Citing Literature
- 1). Understand what constitutes plagiarism. Plagiarism is not just stealing someone's quotes or writings, but it's also using their thought processes and ideas without giving them credit. You must cite any instance in which you use someone else's work.
- 2). Determine what citation format you wish to use. Two of the major forms of citing literature include the American Psychological Association (APA) formatting style and the Modern Language Association (MLA) formatting style. Neither is more acceptable than the other. However, check with your professor if you are a student. A certain format may be preferred in certain high school or university classes.
- 3). Format your citations in two forms. One will be for your in-line citations, and one will be for your reference list. In-line citations must follow any instance in which you use someone else's work and are often annotated (shortened). The reference list citation is the full bibliographical information of your source so that the reader may look it up on his own.
- 4). Create your literature citations in APA format if that is the style you chose in Step 2. In-line APA citations include the author and the publication date of the work you are quoting. For example, if you are quoting John Smith's book published in 1999, you would place a citation as follows: "Quote" (Smith, 1999).
- 5). Format your literature citations in MLA format if that is the citation style you chose in Step 2. In-line MLA citations often include a footnote in which the bibliographical information is included. Such bibliographical information is outlined as follows: Last Name of Author, First Name of Author. Book Title. Publication City: Publisher, Publishing Date. If you are quoting John Smith's book, you would cite it as follows: Smith, John. Book Title. New York: Penguin, 1999.
