Plagiarism Prevention

To give proper credit, you generally need to cite your outside sources in two places:

1. Inside the text of your paper -- this is usually called an in-text or parenthetical citation.
2. At the end of your paper in your Works Cited page -- sometimes called a References page or a Bibliography.

Take a look at the essay on your screen. You can open it in a bigger window if necessary by clicking on Sample MLA Paper. The in-text citations show exactly where you used information from a source whether that is a direct quote or a paraphrase. In MLA format, the in-text citation will include the last name of the author (or a shortened version of the source's title when there is no author) followed by the page number from the source (when available).

An in-text citation should include enough information to direct the reader to the Works Cited page where they can find more information about that source.

In the essay on the screen, do you notice how the in-text citations are all color-coded and numbered to the full citation in the Works Cited page? Even without the color-coding or numbers, do you think you would be able to figure out which in-text citation matches the Works Cited page entry?