The MLA (Modern Language Association) style is commonly used within the liberal arts and humanities to write formal research papers and cite sources. The Quabbin writing guide includes examples for the general format of MLA research papers, in-text citations, endnotes/footnotes, and the Works Cited page.
THE REASON FOR DOCUMENTATION
Documentation or citing of sources is important as a means of supporting the arguments of a paper. Documentation is used to provide precise information about the authors and sources consulted in compiling the paper and as a means of providing those sources to readers. The use of someone else’s words or ideas is often desirable in a paper; academic integrity requires that those sources be acknowledged.
MATERIAL THAT NEEDS TO BE CITED
Cite sources and provide documentation for:
- facts and statistics that are not common knowledge
- quotations
- ideas and opinions that come from a source, even if those concepts are paraphrased or summarized
Facts regarded as common knowledge and those accessible from a number of general reference sources such as the dates of World War I, familiar proverbs, widely used or clichéd quotations, need not be cited.