{"id":266,"date":"2016-08-09T18:16:25","date_gmt":"2016-08-09T18:16:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/styleguide\/?post_type=chapter&p=266"},"modified":"2023-08-02T20:00:26","modified_gmt":"2023-08-02T20:00:26","slug":"text-introduction-to-mla-documentation","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-guidetowriting\/chapter\/text-introduction-to-mla-documentation\/","title":{"raw":"Introduction to MLA Documentation","rendered":"Introduction to MLA Documentation"},"content":{"raw":"MLA style is one of the most common citation and formatting styles you will encounter in your academic career. Any piece of academic writing can use MLA style, from a one-page paper to a full-length scholarly book. It is the most common documentation style for humanities subjects.\r\n\r\nThe importance of using citations is\u00a0explained in the following video. Note that this video is not focused on MLA, and that the in-text citations and Works Cited pages it displays are not in MLA style. The point is to reinforce the concept of citation as vital to academic conversation (and it's plagiarism<\/em>, by the way, not plagarism<\/em>!):\r\n\r\nhttps:\/\/youtu.be\/IMhMuVvXCVw\r\n

The Purpose of MLA Style<\/h2>\r\nThe MLA style guide aims to accomplish several goals:\r\n
    \r\n \t
  1. to assist with the consistent use of edited standardized English in academic writing<\/li>\r\n \t
  2. to ensure consistent formatting and presentation of information, for the sake of clarity and ease of navigation<\/li>\r\n \t
  3. to ensure proper attribution of ideas to their original sources, for the sake of intellectual integrity<\/li>\r\n<\/ol>\r\n
    \r\n

    Citation Resources<\/h3>\r\nThere are many fantastic resources out there that can make the formatting and citation process easier. Some common style guides are found at:\r\n