Chapter 11-2: The “Works Cited” Page
At the end of your Modern Language Association document, you should have a “Works Cited” page. You may know what this is from other formats that you've used under the names of bibliography, mediagraphy, references, reference list, or end-text references.
The title, “Works Cited” appears at the top of the page and is centered. This page provides some general guidelines for MLA, followed by a sample "Works Cited" page.
General Guidelines for the "Works Cited" Page
The alphabetical list of works cited that appears at the end of your paper contains more information about all of the sources you've cited allowing readers to refer to them, as needed. The main characteristics are:
The list of Works Cited must be on a new page at the end of your text
Entries are arranged alphabetically by the author's last name or by the title if there is no author
Titles are italicized (not underlined, unless you are writing your essay out by hand) and all important words should be capitalized
Entries are double-spaced (for the purposes of the examples provided here, single-spacing is used)
Long entries that take up more line are indented on the 2nd (3rd, 4th, etc.) lines.
Each entry must include the publication medium. Examples include: Print, Web, DVD, and Television.
For the purposes of some courses, professors may require students to include hyperlinks to any online sources.
Example MLA Works Cited Entries
What follows are examples of MLA entries on the “Works Cited” page:
Paper Media Such as Books and Printed Works
Book with 1 author
Smith, Lewis. The Culture of Cities. New York: Harcourt, 1938.
Book with 2 or 3 authors
Smith, R. Douglas, Richard Jones, and Mary B. Dowry. Destinies: Canadian History since Confederation. Toronto: Harcourt, 2000.
Book with 4 or more authors
Jones, Richard et al. Economic Geography and Public Policy. Princeton: Princeton UP, 2003.
Two or more books by the same author
Replace the author's name by three hyphens and arrange alphabetically by the book's title:
Smith, Neil. Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business. New York: Viking, 1985.
---. The Disappearance of Childhood. New York: Vintage, 1994.
Anthology or compilation
Jones, Corinne S., ed. Privacy, Domesticity, and Women in Early Modern England. Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2003.
Work in an anthology or an essay in a book
Smith, James. "Hitchcock at the Margins of Noir." Alfred Hitchcock: Centenary Essays. Ed. Richard Allen and S. Ishii-Gonzalès. London: BFI, 1999. 263-77.
Book by a corporate author
Associations, corporations, agencies and organizations are considered authors when there is no single author.
Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. Action against Climate Change: The Kyoto Protocol and Beyond. Paris: OECD, 1999.
Article in a reference book or an entry in an encyclopedia
If the article/entry is signed, include the author's name; if unsigned, begin with the title of the entry
Jones, Charles B. "Existentialism." Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Ed. Edward Craig. 10 vols. London: Routledge, 1998.
Book in a series
Smith, Harold, ed. André Malraux. New York: Chelsea House, 1988. Print. Modern Critical Views.
Book by a corporate author
Associations, corporations, agencies and organizations are considered authors when there is no single author.
Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. Action against Climate Change: The Kyoto Protocol and Beyond. Paris: OECD, 1999.
Book in a series
Smith, Harold, ed. André Malraux. New York: Chelsea House, 1988. Print. Modern Critical Views.
A translation
Jones, Franz. Metamorphosis. Trans. and Ed. Stanley Corngold. New York: Bantam, 1972.
A government publication
Canada. Dept. of Foreign Affairs and International Trade. Freedom from Fear: Canada's Foreign Policy for Human Security. Ottawa: DFAIT, 2002.
United Nations. Dept. of Economic and Social Affairs. Population Division. Charting the Progress of Populations. New York: UN, 2000.
Article in a reference book or an entry in an encyclopedia
If the article/entry is signed, include the author's name; if unsigned, begin with the title of the entry
Jones, Charles B. "Existentialism." Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Ed. Edward Craig. 10 vols. London: Routledge, 1998.
A translation
Jones, Franz. Metamorphosis. Trans. and Ed. Stanley Corngold. New York: Bantam, 1972.
A government publication
Canada. Dept. of Foreign Affairs and International Trade. Freedom from Fear: Canada's Foreign Policy for Human Security. Ottawa: DFAIT, 2002.
United Nations. Dept. of Economic and Social Affairs. Population Division. Charting the Progress of Populations. New York: UN, 2000.
Article in a journal
Article retrieved in print/paper format:
Jones, Ada. "Cuba 1898: Rethinking Race, Nation, and Empire." Radical History Review 73 (1999): 22-49.
Smith, Glenn K. S. "The Third Man: Pulp Fiction and Art Film." Literature Film Quarterly 21.3 (1993): 171-178.
Article in a newspaper or magazine
Jones, Susan. "Feeling Right at Home: Government Residence Eschews Traditional Rules." Montreal Gazette 28 Dec. 1995, Final Ed.: A4. Print.
Smith, Sharon Doyle. "After Divorce." Maclean's 20 Apr. 1998: 38-43.
For newspaper and magazine articles retrieved online, please see examples for journal articles retrieved from a library database.
Musical composition, published score
Beethoven, Ludwig van. Symphony no. 4 in B-flat major, op. 60. Mineola, NY: Dover, 2001.
Work of art, photographed, in a book
Cassatt, Mary. Mother and Child. 1890. Wichita Art Museum, Wichita. American Painting: 1560-1913. By John Pearce. New York: McGraw, 1964. Slide 22.
A review
Jones, Walter. "The Wages of Righteousness." Rev. of Cloudsplitter, by Russell Banks. New York Times Book Review 22 Feb. 1998: 9. Print.
Smith, Stanley. "A New Spielberg." Rev of Schindler's List, dir. Steven Spielberg. New Republic 13 Dec. 1993: 30.
Online Texts
Article retrieved in a library database:
Provide the same information as you would for a printed journal article and add the name of the database in italics, and indicate the publication medium as Web and the date of access.
NOTE - If there are no page numbers, or if the page numbers for each article in a journal appear in a new sequence for each item rather than continuously across the entire issue, write n. pag.
Smith, Katherine Stern. "Culture in the Cities: Provincial Academies during the Early Years of Louis XIV's Reign." Canadian Journal of History 38.1 (2003): 19-42. CBCA Complete. Web. 29 Mar. 2004.
Jones, Marc and Bruce G. Smith. "Peer-assisted Leadership: Reducing Educational Managers' Professional Isolation." Journal of Educational Administration 34.3 (1996): 5-14. ABI/INFORM Global. Web. 29 Mar. 2004.
Smith, Li, Paul Jones, and Phil Dowry. "Reservoir Resettlement in China: Past Experience and the Three Gorges Dam." The Geographical Journal 167.3 (2001): 195-212. Academic Search Premier. Web. 29 Mar. 2004.
Article reprinted in a reference book online
Smith, Eric W. “The Range of Symbolism in Poetry.” The South Atlantic Quarterly 48.3 (1949): 442-52. Rpt. in Poetry Criticism. Ed. Jane Kelly Kosek and Christine Slovey. Vol. 13. Detroit: Gale, 1995. 83-84. Literature Criticism Online. 18 Oct. 2009, https://www.lit-online.educ/Da711QSr.
Article retrieved on the Web:
Jones, Dalbir S. "Wrestling and Popular Culture." CCLWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture 4.1 (2002): n. pag. 29 Mar. 2009, https://www.ccl.edu/compare-lit.
An entire Web site
Jones, Douglas O. Famous Trials. Univ. of Missouri Kansas-City Law School, 2009. Web. 29 Apr. 2009, https://www.mkcls.com.
A page on a Web site
An entry for a nonperiodical item found on the Web contains the following:
Last name, First name. "Document title if available." Title of the overall Web site. Version or edition if available. Publisher or N.p. to designate no publisher, publication date or n.d. to mean no date. Web.
If you cannot find some of this information, include only what is available.
"Joyce Wieland." Celebrating Women's Achievements: Women Artists in Canada. National Library of Canada, 2000. Web. 29 Mar. 2004, https://www.nlc.com/examples.
Smith, Penny. "You Can't Read That." NBC New York. NBC Universal, 18 Apr. 2009. Web. 29 Apr. 2009, https://www.NBC.com/31Qaa71.
Article reprinted in a reference book online
Smith, Eric W. “The Range of Symbolism in Poetry.” The South Atlantic Quarterly 48.3 (1949): 442-52. Rpt. in Poetry Criticism. Ed. Jane Kelly Kosek and Christine Slovey. Vol. 13. Detroit: Gale, 1995. 83-84. Literature Criticism Online. Web. 18 Oct. 2009.
Non-Text Media
Television or radio program
"Scandal of the Century." Narr. Linden MacIntyre. The Fifth Estate. CBC Television. 23 Jan. 2002. Television.
Sound recording
Jones, Duke. "Black and Tan Fantasy." Music is My Mistress. Musicmasters, 1989. CD.
Film, videorecording or DVD
The Shining. Dir. Stanley Kubrick. Perf. Jack Nicholson, Shelley Duvall. Warner Bros., 1980. Videocassette.
Macbeth. Dir. Roman Polanski. Perf. Jon Finch, Francesca Annis, and Nicholas Selby. 1971. Columbia, 2002. DVD.
Online video
Last name, First name of the creator. “Title of the video or audio.” Title of the Website, role of contributors and their First name Last name, Version, Numbers, Publisher, Publication date, URL.
McLovin, Fogell. “My Take Existentialism.” YouTube, uploaded by Great Ideas, 3 July 2021, www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkdzy4bWW3E.
Microsoft. “The future of 3D computing.” YouTube, commentary by Jack Smith, 27 Mar. 2021, youtu.be/gK645_7TA2c.
“Zebras in Their Element.” YouTube, uploaded by CutiePie, 6 June 2021, www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQlpjSEtELs.
MLA Sample "Works Cited" Page
Further examples and explanations can be accessed by entering “MLA” in the search field at http://jamies.tips