MLA Style Guide, 8th & 9th Editions: Title Of Source - IRSC Libraries

The title of source is the second core element in the Works Cited entry. In general, the title of a work is taken from the title page of the publication.

• List the full title as it is written on the source. Exceptions to this rule are for standardization of capitalization and subtitle punctuation.
  • Capitalize all principal words (nouns, verbs, adjectives, etc.). Do not capitalize articles, prepositions, or conjunctions when they fall in the middle of a title.
  • Separate a subtitle with a colon and a space.
• Italicize titles if the source is self-contained and independent. Titles of books, plays, films, periodicals, databases, and websites are italicized.
• Place titles in quotation marks if the source is part of a larger work. Articles, essays, chapters, poems, webpages, songs, and speeches are placed in quotation marks.
• Sometimes titles will contain other titles. For example, a journal article about a novel, short story, play, film, etc. may mention the title of the work the article is about in the article's title.
  • If the title mentioned is usually indicated by italics, use italics for the title within the title. Examples of these titles are films, novels, entire books, journals, and entire websites.
    • Example of a journal article title which includes the title of a book: "Unbearable Weight of Authenticity: Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God and Theory of 'Touristic Reading'."
  • If the title mentioned is usually indicated by double quotation marks, enclose the title in single quotations marks. Examples of these titles are poems, short stories, book chapters, and journal articles.
    • Example of a journal article title which includes the title of a short story: "Individualism in O'Connor's 'A Good Man is Hard to Find'."

Books:

Danticat, Edwidge. Brother, I'm Dying.Knopf, 2007.

Chapter title in a book or anthology:

Howard, Rebecca Moore. “Avoiding Sentence Fragments.” Writing Matters: A Handbook for Writing and Research, 2nd ed., McGraw Hill, 2014, pp. 600-10.

Journals, Magazines, and Newspapers:

Houtman, Eveline. “Mind-Blowing: Fostering Self-Regulated Learning in Information Literacy Instruction.” Communications in Information Literacy, vol. 9, no. 1, 2015, pp. 6-18. www.comminfolit.org/index.php?journal=cil&page=article&op=view&path%5B%5D=v9i1p6&path%5B%5D=203​.

Web page:

Meade, Rita. "It's Not Too Late to Advocate." Screwy Decimal, 1 June 2016, www.screwydecimal.com/2016/06/its-not-too-late-to-advocate.html.

Entire Website:

Meade, Rita. Screwy Decimal.2010-16, www.screwydecimal.com/.