General Differences between MLA and APA

Many students ask for a list of the main differences between MLA and APA. Please see
below. This list was obtained from Bellevue Universitys Writing Center.
The main differences between MLA and APA are as follows:
Type

MLA Format

APA Format

Date:

The date follows the publisher in the

citation and is not in parentheses.

The date follows the author and is in

parentheses.

Authors
Name:

The authors full name (first and last) is

spelled out.

The authors last name is spelled out and

the first name is reduced to initials.

Capitalization
:

All major words in the title are capitalized

and the title is underlined.

Only the first word of the title, the first

word of a subtitle, and any proper nouns
(like names) are capitalized. Everything
else is lowercase. Also, the title is written
in italics.

Source Page:

The source page is called a Works

Cited.

The source page is called a References.

In-Text
Citations:

MLA uses the last name of the author and

the page number.

APA uses the last name of the author and

the date.

MLA does not uses commas to separate

the material, or p. pp. before the page
numbers.

APA does use commas and, if a page is

mentioned, uses p. and pp.

Differences between MLA and APA Examples:

MLA: (Burns_101)
APA: (Burns, 1999, p. 4)

Here are two comparison examples:

MLA:
Klaphake, Elizabeth. My Life as an English Professor. Bellevue,
Nebraska: Bellevue University Press. 1999.
APA:

Klaphake, E. (1999). My life as an English professor. Bellevue,

Nebraska: Bellevue University Press.

Writing a Bibliography: MLA Format

Below are standard formats and examples for basic bibliographic information recommended by the
Modern Language Association (MLA). For more information on the MLA format,
see http://www.mla.org/style_faq.

Basics
Your list of works cited should begin at the end of the paper on a new page with the centered title, Works
Cited. Alphabetize the entries in your list by the author's last name, using the letter-by-letter system
(ignore spaces and other punctuation.) If the author's name is unknown, alphabetize by the title, ignoring
any A, An, orThe.
For dates, spell out the names of months in the text of your paper, but abbreviate them in the list of works
cited, except for May, June, and July. Use either the day-month-year style (22 July 1999) or the monthday-year style (July 22, 1999) and be consistent. With the month-day-year style, be sure to add a comma
after the year unless another punctuation mark goes there.

Underlining or Italics?
When reports were written on typewriters, the names of publications were underlined because most
typewriters had no way to print italics. If you write a bibliography by hand, you should still underline the
names of publications. But, if you use a computer, then publication names should be in italics as they are
below. Always check with your instructor regarding their preference of using italics or underlining. Our
examples use italics.

Hanging Indentation
All MLA citations should use hanging indents, that is, the first line of an entry should be flush left, and the
second and subsequent lines should be indented 1/2".

Capitalization, Abbreviation, and Punctuation

The MLA guidelines specify using title case capitalization - capitalize the first words, the last words, and
all principal words, including those that follow hyphens in compound terms. Use lowercase abbreviations
to identify the parts of a work (e.g., vol. for volume, ed. for editor) except when these designations follow a
period. Whenever possible, use the appropriate abbreviated forms for the publisher's name
(Random instead of Random House).
Separate author, title, and publication information with a period followed by one space. Use a colon and a
space to separate a title from a subtitle. Include other kinds of punctuation only if it is part of the title. Use
quotation marks to indicate the titles of short works appearing within larger works (e.g., "Memories of
Childhood." American Short Stories). Also use quotation marks for titles of unpublished works and songs.

Format Examples
Books
Format:
Author's last name, first name. Book title. Additional information. City of publication: Publishing company,
publication date.
Examples:
Allen, Thomas B. Vanishing Wildlife of North America. Washington, D.C.: National Geographic Society,
1974.
Boorstin, Daniel J. The Creators: A History of the Heroes of the Imagination. New York: Random, 1992.
Hall, Donald, ed. The Oxford Book of American Literacy Anecdotes. New York: Oxford UP, 1981.
Searles, Baird, and Martin Last. A Reader's Guide to Science Fiction. New York: Facts on File, Inc., 1979.
Toomer, Jean. Cane. Ed. Darwin T. Turner. New York: Norton, 1988.

Encyclopedia & Dictionary

Format:
Author's last name, first name. "Title of Article." Title of Encyclopedia. Date.
Note: If the dictionary or encyclopedia arranges articles alphabetically, you may omit volume and page
numbers.
Examples:
"Azimuthal Equidistant Projection." Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary. 10th ed. 1993.
Pettingill, Olin Sewall, Jr. "Falcon and Falconry." World Book Encyclopedia. 1980.
Tobias, Richard. "Thurber, James." Encyclopedia Americana. 1991 ed.

Magazine & Newspaper Articles

Format:
Author's last name, first name. "Article title." Periodical title Volume # Date: inclusive pages.
Note: If an edition is named on the masthead, add a comma after the date and specify the edition.
Examples:
Hall, Trish. "IQ Scores Are Up, and Psychologists Wonder Why." New York Times 24 Feb. 1998, late ed.:
F1+.
Kalette, Denise. "California Town Counts Down to Big Quake." USA Today 9 21 July 1986: sec. A: 1.
Kanfer, Stefan. "Heard Any Good Books Lately?" Time 113 21 July 1986: 71-72.
Trillin, Calvin. "Culture Shopping." New Yorker 15 Feb. 1993: 48-51.

Website or Webpage
Format:
Author's last name, first name (if available). "Title of work within a project or database." Title of site,
project, or database. Editor (if available). Electronic publication information (Date of publication or of the
latest update, and name of any sponsoring institution or organization). Date of access and <full URL>.
Note: If you cannot find some of this information, cite what is available.
Examples:
Devitt, Terry. "Lightning injures four at music festival." The Why? Files. 2 Aug. 2001. 23 Jan. 2002
<http://whyfiles.org /137lightning/index.html>.

Dove, Rita. "Lady Freedom among Us." The Electronic Text Center. Ed. David Seaman. 1998. Alderman
Lib., U of Virginia. 19 June 1998 <http://etext.lib.virginia.edu /subjects/afam.html>.
Lancashire, Ian. Homepage. 28 Mar. 2002. 15 May 2002 <http://www.chass.utoronto.ca:8080 /~ian/>.
Levy, Steven. "Great Minds, Great Ideas." Newsweek 27 May 2002. 10 June 2002
<http://www.msnbc.com /news/754336.asp>.

Websites
For a passing reference to a website in text, the URL is sufficient; no reference list entry is needed.
Gussie Fink-Nottle has set up a discussion forum for newt fanciers (http://gfnnfg.livejournal.com/).
However, when you are citing a particular document or piece of information from a website, include both a reference
list entry and an in-text citation. The key to creating the reference list entry is to determine the type of content on the
web page. Basically, provide the following four pieces of information:
Author, A. (date). Title of document [Format description]. Retrieved from http://xxxxxxxxx
The in-text citation includes the author and date (Author, date), as with any other APA Style citation.

In-Text Citations
In-text citations consist of the surname(s) of the author(s) and the year of publication.

If there is no author, use the title (or a short form of the title, if it is lengthy) and the year. Titles that are
italicized in the reference list are italicized in text; titles that are not italicized in the reference list appear in quotation
marks.
If there is no date, use n.d. (without quotation marks) instead.

E-Books
The reference list entry for an e-book includes the author, date, title, and source (URL or DOI). For a chapter in an ebook, include the chapter title and page numbers (if available).
Whole e-book:
Author, A. (date). Title of book. Retrieved from http://xxxxxxxxx
Author, A. (date). Title of book. doi:xxxxxxxxxxxx

Chapter in an e-book:
Author, A. (date). Title of chapter. In E. Editor (Ed.), Title of book (pp. xxxx). Retrieved from http://xxxxxxxxx
Author, A. (date). Title of chapter. In E. Editor (Ed.), Title of book (pp. xxxx). doi:xxxxxxxxxx
The in-text citation includes the author and date, as with any other APA Style citation.

Interviews
The citation of interviews depends on the nature of the interview.

Third-party interviews: If the interview is in a form that is recoverable (e.g., a recording, transcript,
published Q&A), use the reference format appropriate for the source in which the interview is available.
Informational interviews: If you have interviewed someone for information about your topic and that
person has agreed to be identified as a source, cite the source as a personal communication (in text only):
(G. Fink-Nottle, personal communication, April 5, 2011)
Personal communications do not have reference list entries because they cannot be retrieved.

Interviews of research participants: No citation is needed for remarks made by participants in the
research on which youre reporting. Do not cite these as personal communications; this would breach the participants
guarantee of confidentiality.

YouTube
Heres the general format for creating a reference for a video found on YouTube and other video-posting websites:

If both the real name of the person who posted the video and the screen name are known:
Author, A. A. [Screen name]. (year, month day). Title of video [Video file]. Retrieved from http://xxxxxxxxx

If only the screen name of the person who posted the video is known:
Screen name. (year, month day). Title of video [Video file]. Retrieved from http://xxxxxxxxx The in-text citations
include the author name outside of brackets (whichever that may be) and the date.

Bibliography Versus Reference List

In APA Style, include a reference list rather than a bibliography with your paper.
Whats the difference? A reference list consists of all sources cited in the text of a paper, listed alphabetically by
authors surname. A bibliography, however, may include resources that were consulted but not cited in the text as

well as an annotated description of each one. Bibliographies may be organized chronologically, or by subject, rather
than alphabetically.
If you have been given an assignment that asks for a bibliography, consult your instructor for more specifics about the
required format.

A Comparison of MLA and APA citation styles

In-text parenthetical citation:

MLA: Parenthetical citation in MLA style must include at least the author's name. It should also
include the page number if a specific page is cited, and a short title if more than one work by the
same author is listed in the Works Cited page at the end of the paper.
Example 1: "In 'Escaping the demon,' a story about mental illness, the protagonist's point of view
is portrayed through a mosaic style which the narrator refers to as "looking at life through broken
glass" (Williams 12).
Example 2: "Abrams succinctly outlines his version of the history of literary criticism prior to the
Renaissance through the metaphor of the mirror "representing reality unblinkingly (98)."
Example 3: "One writer has characterized the effect of computerization on the human psyche as
spiritual saturation (Gergen, "Social Saturation," 45).

APA: Very similar to MLA. APA in-text citation must include at least the author's name; also, the
year of publication (with letters for multiple sources published the same year [1989a, 1989b]),
and the page number, designated as p. 123. APA uses more commas to separate blocks of
information than MLA.
Example 1: Hoffenstreich's first book (1995) was a masterpiece of threaded narration.
Example 2: Studies by Self and Hilligoss suggest that "students' revision skills and commitment
actually decline with word processing" (1993b, p. 33).
Example 3: However, a recent biography of Yeats (Mariani, 1997) revealed that the poet was
dysfunctional.

End-of-text bibliography:

Both MLA and APA include the same basic information:

1. Author's name
2. Title of book/article
3. Journal title*
4. Year of publication
5. Publisher
6. Place of publication
7. Volume number*
8. Pages*
* = applies to journal articles

MLA: Author's name. Title. Place of publication: publisher, year. Notice that the year is the last
item, and that it is not used for parenthetical in-text citation. University presses are abbreviated
UP, as in Oxford UP. Hanging indent. Journal article titles are placed inside double quotation
marks.

Example 1:
Smith, John. Deconstructing Colonialism: the discourse of the Empire, 1837-1898. Bloomington,
IL: Illinois Wesleyan UP, 1998.
Example 2:
Rosenberg, Arthur. "Is there a text in this universe?" Studies in Teaching College Astrology, 12
(1997): 221-242.

APA: Author's name. Year of publication in parentheses. Title. Place of publication: publisher.
University presses are not abbreviated. Hanging indent. Remember that works by the same author
published in the same year are designated 1998a, 1998b, and are ordered alphabetically. Journal
article titles are not put in quotation marks. Author's first name is abbreviated.
Example 1:
Smith, J. (1998). Deconstructing Colonialism: the discourse of the Empire, 1837-1898.
Bloomington, IL: Illinois Wesleyan University Press.
Example 2:
Rosenberg, A. (1997). Is there a text in this universe? Studies in Teaching College Astrology, 12,
221-242.

Electronic sources:
MLA
See the MLA's website for correct electronic source citation style. But in general, here's what should be
included:

publication date. This would be either the date the page was created or last modified, AND the
date of access. (So each citation should have two dates.) If the website is a digitized version of a
print source, the date of the print source can be included as well.

URLs. These should always be included, and should be demarcated with angle brackets, as in
<www.mla.org>. Break long URLs after a forward slash.

pages. Cite page or paragraph numbers if available.

organization. The organization sponsoring the site, or to which the individual belongs, should be
listed.

versions. Which version or edition of an electronic source is very important and should be
included.
Examples:
Gray, Paul. "Paradise Found." Time 19 Jan. 1998. 5 Feb. 1998.
<http://www.pathfinder.com/time/magazine/1998/dom/980119/cover1.html>.
Twain, Mark. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. Ed. Internet Wiretap. 1993. 15 Jan. 1998.
<http://www.cs.cmu.edu/People/rgs/sawyr-table.html>
Chadima, Steve. "Re: Businesss as Poker." E-mail to Leonard J. Rosen. 14 Aug. 1998.
Nostroni, Eric. "Collaborative Learning in a Networked Environment." Online posting. 8 Sept.
1997. Electronic Forum. 9 Nov. 1997. <eforum@cgu.edu>
Richardson, Lea. Online debate. "The Politics of Recycling." 16 Aug. 1997. EnviroMOO. 16
Aug. 1997. <telnet://enviro.moo.greenearth.org:42557.
"Industrial Revolution." Concise Columbia Encyclopedia. CD-ROM. Redmond: Microsoft, 1994.

APA
See the APA's website for electronic source citation style (http://www.apa.org/journals/webref.html).
APA style follows the style for print sources closely. Open with author, date, and title. Then follow with a
denotation of the type of electronic source, and follow up with the URL or the source location
information.
Examples:
NCTE. (1987). On writing centers. [CD-ROM]. Urbana: ERIC Clearning House. Silver Platter.

Keegan, J. (1999). Normandy: The invasion conceived, 1941-43. In Encyclopedia Britannica [Online].
URL http://normandy.eb.com/normandy/week1/buildup.html
Dice, R. (1998, June 15). Web Database Crash course--Lesson 1 [WWW document]. URL
http://www.hotwired.com/webmonkey/98/24/index0a. html?tw=frontdoor