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Mla and Apa Styles of Documentation

The document compares the two citation styles MLA and APA. MLA is used in the humanities and APA is used in the social sciences. Some key differences are that MLA uses author-work citations while APA uses author-date citations, MLA orders bibliographic entries alphabetically by author then work while APA orders alphabetically by author then chronologically by work, and MLA uses "Works Cited" while APA uses "References."

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Jennifer Oestar
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58 views2 pages

Mla and Apa Styles of Documentation

The document compares the two citation styles MLA and APA. MLA is used in the humanities and APA is used in the social sciences. Some key differences are that MLA uses author-work citations while APA uses author-date citations, MLA orders bibliographic entries alphabetically by author then work while APA orders alphabetically by author then chronologically by work, and MLA uses "Works Cited" while APA uses "References."

Uploaded by

Jennifer Oestar
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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MLA and APA

Styles of Documentation
MLA APA
American Psychological
Governing Body Modern Language Association
Association

Users Humanities Social Sciences

aka Author-Work Author-Date

Bibliographic list Works Cited References

Order of entries in Alphabetical by author, then Alphabetical by author, then


bibliographic list alphabetical by work chronological by work

Names Last, First, Middle Initial Last, First Initial, Middle Initial

Dates Not used in-text Prominent in-text

Article Titles In quotation marks Not in quotation marks

Capitalization All Major Words Capitalized First words only capitalized

Notes (Foot or End) Not used for references Not used for references

In-text parenthesis (Name space page number) (Name comma year comma p.#)
(Levin 13) (Levin, 1982, p. 13)

And Spelled out Ampersand except running text

Secondary citation ( qtd. in Levin 13) (cited in Levin, 1982, p. 13)

Publisher's names Many abbreviated Rarely Abbreviated

Trailing punctuation Not underlined Underlined

Multiple works by same Works alphabetical, three hyphens Works chronological, name
author and a period for name repeated for each entry

Et al Four or more authors Six or more authors

Tense of reporting Present: Smith claims . . . Past: Smith claimed . . .


APA—Basic Format

Author, A. A. (Year of publication). Title of work: Capital letter also

for subtitle. Location: Publisher.

Note: For "Location," you should always list the city and the state using the two letter postal abbreviation without
periods (New York, NY).

Example:

Calfee, R. C., & Valencia, R. R. (1991). APA guide to preparing

manuscripts for journal publication. Washington, DC: American

Psychological Association.

Book—MLA
Binns, Tristan Boyer. The Bald Eagle. Chicago: Rourke, 2001. Print.
Book—APA
Binns, T. B. (2001). The bald eagle. Chicago, Il: Rourke Publishers.

Nonperiodical Web Document, Web Page, or Report


List as much of the following information as possible (you sometimes have to hunt around to find the information;
don't be lazy. If there is a page like http://www.somesite.com/somepage.htm, and somepage.htm doesn't have the
information you're looking for, move up the URL to http://www.somesite.com/):

Author, A. A., & Author, B. B. (Date of publication). Title of document.

Retrieved from http://Web address

NOTE: When an Internet document is more than one Web page, provide a URL that links to the home page or entry
page for the document. Also, if there isn't a date available for the document use (n.d.) for no date.

Web Page—MLA
Green, Joshua. “The Rove Presidency.” The Atlantic.com. Atlantic Monthly Group, Sept. 2007. Web.

15 May 2008.

Web Page—APA
Green, J. (2007, September). The Rove presidency. The Atlantic.com. Retrieved from

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2007/09/the-rove-presidency/6132/.

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