Citation and Writing Guide: MLA In-Text Citations

In-text citations are one of two ways a writer gives credit to a source for their information in an MLA formatted paper. In-Text Citations are the parenthetical citations within the body paragraphs of your paper intended to point your reader to one of the citations in your Works Cited Page. Reference Citations are the citations included at the end of your paper in your Works Cited Page.

For MLA Style, you will generally follow the author-page number method for in-text citations:

(Author’s Last Name Page Number)

For sources that do not have page numbers like websites or course material uploaded in Canvas, do not put a page number.

Power Tip: Be sure that your In-Text Citations are consistent with your Reference Citations. Learn more about Works Cited Citations here.

To create an in-text citation for this source, we would start by determining which page we are citing from in the book. In this case, we are referencing the text on page 29. The in-text citation for this source would be (O'Brien 29).

PLEASE NOTE: There is no comma between the author's last name and the page number. The period comes after the parentheses.

For this source, in-text citation for citing information from page 68 would be (Skapura and Marlowe 68).

For this source, in-text citation for citing information from page 46 would be (Khorsand et al. 46).

NO KNOWN AUTHOR

For sources with no known author, the in-text citation should match the first element of the Works Cited entry. This may be the title of the article, webpage, website, etc.

• If the source title is longer than four words, shorten it to the first word or phrase of the source name, excluding words like a, an, and the.
  • Example: “A Quick Guide to Editing” would become (“Quick Guide”).
     
• If the source is a whole website or an entire book, use italics for your in-text citation.
• If the source is contained within a larger work, like a page on a website or a chapter of a book, use “quotation marks” for your in-text citation.

Below you will find three different ways you can include in-text citations in your paper.

1. AUTHOR'S NAME NOT IN SENTENCE

Paraphrasing is writing something in your own words based on information from your source. If you do not include the author’s name in your sentence, you include the full in-text citation at the end of the sentence.

The format would be: (Author's Last Name Page Number).

Example: The basis for fluency is being able to understand the meaning of the text by identifying words and placing them in the correct context (Tyner 19).

2. USING THE AUTHOR'S NAME IN THE SENTENCE

When you include the author’s name in the paraphrased sentence, you would then include the (Page Number) as your in-text citation at the end of the sentence.

Example: Tyner asserts the basis for fluency is being able to understand the meaning of the text by identifying words and placing them in the correct context (19).

3. AFTER A DIRECT QUOTE

You have a few options for in-text citations when using a direct quote, depending on if you use the author’s name in the sentence or not.

Power Tip: Make sure to set up the quote with a signal phrase like "The author writes" or "The author discusses" before quoting someone else.

Examples:

• The author discusses: “The foundation of fluency is in the ability to identify words quickly and accurately in context, as well as using the correct intonation needed to understand the text’s message” (Tyner 19).
• Tyner writes, “The foundation of fluency is in the ability to identify words quickly and accurately in context, as well as using the correct intonation needed to understand the text’s message” (19).