Citations and Works Cited page

Rule #1: The title Works Cited must be CENTERED at the top of the page. Everything else should be aligned to the left of the page.

Rule #2: The Works Cited page must be double spaced. The second line of each entry (if it goes over 1 line), must be a hanging indent.

Rule #3: The Works Cited Page must be alphabetized according to the author’s LAST name! If NO AUTHOR is listed, alphabetize according to the title of the article. What if your entry starts with the word “The” like this: “The Health Benefits of…” You’ll alphabetize it under T.

Rule #4: If more that one author exists for the source, you MUST give both authors on the Works Cited page. The format is this: Last name, first name, and first name last name. Smith, Jennifer, and Kelly Johnson.

Rule #5: January Jan. February Feb. March Mar. April Apr. May June Jun. July Jul. August Aug. September Sep. October Oct. November Nov. December Dec. Months of publication must be abbreviated. Use the first three letters of the month. Exception to the rule…MAY! It’s only three letters. 

Rule #6: Titles of articles are in quotation marks. Bigger works (newspapers, books, journals, websites) are italicized.

Rule #7: The dates you look at are the published date the accessed date. For websites and databases ONLY, you will include an accessed date. This is the LAST date entered on the works cited entry. Pedicini, Sandra. "Amid Whale Furor, Some Attractions Curb or Cut Shows." Orlando Sentinel. 28 Sep. 2014: p. A.1. SIRS Issues Researcher. Web. 7 Oct. 2014.

Rule #7: Dates go in this format: Day Month Year 10 Oct. 2014 If the published date is in parenthesis (2010), it means that the source is not published weekly or monthly, but yearly.

Rule #8: You have to look for the page numbers Newspapers have different numbering (A1, E9) If a source is only 1 page long, and it happens to be on the 28th page, you need to include that in you in-text citations.

Like these!

In-text (parenthetical) citations The Works Cited page is only half the battle! Now, you need to review how to correctly cite sources in the actual text of a paper.

See the first word of each WC entry?

This is the word you should use for your citations This is the word you should use for your citations. They look like this:

So basically, you take the very first word of the entry, no matter what it is, and use it for your citation.

For example, the citation for the first article on our WC page would start like this: (Adler

Then, you put the page number of the piece of info you are using in your paper. Since the Adler article doesn’t include page numbers, we skip it.

So the citation for the Adler article would look like this:

Let’s say we wanted to cite the last article Let’s say we wanted to cite the last article. It would look like this: (Wildman 465)

Notice: there is NO COMMA. Let’s say we wanted to cite the last article. It would look like this: (Wildman 465) Notice: there is NO COMMA.

Question: If there are two authors, do I use both last names as my citation, like this? (Smith, Barnes)

Answer: Nope. Still just use whichever one is the first word of the entry. So the citation will look like this: (Smith)

Question: How would I cite something I quote from the first page of the Education Digest article?

Answer: (St. Gerard 56)

Question: What if I just summarize or paraphrase something—do I still have to cite it since I put it in my own words?

Answer: Yes, you do! Even if you summarize or paraphrase (that is, put the info in your own words), you still need to cite it in your paper.

Questions? I won’t ask you questions about things like “is there a comma or a period after the article title” But I will expect you to be able to create citations, find and fix common errors in formatting and dates, and look at a correct WC page in order to fix one that is incorrect.