The above sample essay is OUTDATED. It is from the 6th edition, not the 7th. The tale-tell clue is the Works Cited page. Current MLA guidelines no longer require URLs for internet sources but DO require identification of the type of source (print, web, film, etc.). This is very important for source identification in any student or professional essay.
Omission of the source type usually results in major point deductions from the instructor. Please update this sample document! The in-text citations are correct, but the Works Cited page is completely wrong.
Respond: Thank you Davis. This paper has been updated to follow the style guidelines in the latest MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers, 7th edition. Delilah June 3, 2013 at 5:18 pm.
If you are using Microsoft Word to type your papers, it has a built-in APA citation formatter in it. Go to the tob tab that says references, make sure the format is APA (instead of MLA or Chicago), click manage sources. You can enter in all the source information for your paper here, by type. Then as you type, you can insert click the insert citation buttion to add an in-text citation. When finished you can use the bibliography button to generate a works cited section or a bibliography page in the proper format. I had to ask this question to several of my friends because they had gone back to school before I did and I knew they uesd something. Several are avaliable to download for around $30.
The one that friends of mine have used and like is I am going to dowload it my self later today. I have been useing citiation machine for my references that is free on line. And like others have said owl. My school also has way that you can turn your paper into a company and it takes 24 hours for them to get back to you with corrections.It is called Smarthinking. For my school it is located on the blackboard learning System in the dropdown menu for each class on the left hand side. If you school subscribes to RefWorks, that will do it for you, but your school has to subscribe. I use a program you buy, called Endnote, but it's not cheap (usually about $100 if you buy at the student rate through your college bookstore)-I'm an English prof and published author, so it's clearly worth it for me, but it's not necessarily worth it for only undergrad papers.
ProCite is similar, but also not cheap. As a previous poster pointed out, Word 2007 or 2010 will do it for you under the 'references' tab. If you're using books, go to worldcat.org, look up the book, then click on the 'citation' link, and it will show you how to cite the book in a variety of formats (MLA, APA, etc.) Free online sites that will format your citations for you include and easybib.com For both of these, you plug in the information, and it will format it for you. None of these will check your paper for you-you still need to know what you need to cite, and where from-but they all will format your citations for you in APA form.
If you need help figuring out what to cite (to avoid plagiarism! Please don't plagiarize! I HATE having to flunk students for plagiarism!), google the website for The Everyday Writer and you'll find information and tutorials for learning what you need to cite, how to properly quote, paraphrase, etc.
Congrats on going back to school, and GL!