The works cited list is a separate page at the end of your work that contains a complete list of sources you have used in your paper/essay with each entry containing the relevant core elements. Here are some details to keep in mind when formatting your Works Cited page:
- Start a new page for your Works Cited list (e.g., if your paper is 4 pages long, start your Works Cited list on page 5).
- Center the title, Works Cited, at the top of the page and do not bold or underline it.
- Double-space the list.
- Start the first line of each citation at the left margin; indent each subsequent line five spaces (use "hanging indent" capability in Word).
- Put your list in alphabetical order. Alphabetize the list by the first word in the citation. In most cases, the first word will be the author’s last name. Where the author is unknown, alphabetize by the first word in the title, ignoring the words a, an, the.
- For the first author, give the last name followed by a comma and the first name followed by a period. If there is more than one author, check the rules here.
- Italicize the titles of full works, such as:
- books
- audiovisual material, including film titles
- websites
- newspaper, magazines, journals
- Use quotation marks for titles of parts of works, such as:
- articles from newspapers, magazines, or journals
- essays, poems, short stories, or chapter titles from a book
- chapters or sections of an Internet document
See also MLA Handbook 9th edition (p. 105-226).