Basic Format Two or Three Authors Corporate Author A Work from a Collection
One Author More than Three Authors No Author Reference Books

Basic Format for Print Book Citations:

The basic format for printed book entries is as follows (Gibaldi 147; Purdue 7):

Author(s). Title of Book. Place of Publication: Publisher, Year of Publication.
When listing the name of the publisher, a shortened form of that name is used.  Chapter 7 of the 6th edition of the MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers contains guidelines to consider when using a shortened version of the publisher name (Gibaldi 272-74).  For example, you can use a one-word description of the publisher name (Prentice instead of Prentice Hall) or an appropriate abbreviation (GPO instead of Government Printing Office).  When using a source from a university press, represent this with the abbreviations U and P, respectively.

Other pieces of information may be required to complete the entry.  When available, the additional book information should be entered in the following order (Gibaldi 152):

  1. Author's name (Last Name, First Name format)
  2. Title of a part of the book (this is used mostly for works from an anthology or for articles from reference books)
  3. Title of the book (underlined)
  4. Name of the editor, translator or compiler
  5. Edition of the book
  6. Number(s) of the volume(s) used
  7. Name of the series
  8. Place of publication (followed by a colon [:]), publisher name, and date of publication
  9. Page numbers (if using a work found in an anthology)
  10. Supplementary bibliographic information/annotation (if available)
Further information and examples of print book citations are available from the "Research and Documentation Online: Humanities: Documenting Sources" web site (based on the publication by Diana Hacker).


Basic Format | One Author | Two or Three Authors | More than Three Authors | Corporate Author | No Author | Reference Books | Work from a Collection

One Author:

An entry for a book with one author would be written as follows:

Black, Uyless. Voice Over IP. 2nd ed. Prentice Hall Series in Advanced Communications
Technologies. Upper Saddle River: Prentice, 2002.
If you've cited multiple sources by the same author, use the author's full name in the first entry only.  For subsequent entries, use three hyphens and a period (---.) in place of the author's name.  Arrange these entries in alphabetical order by title (Gibaldi 153-54; Purdue 7).
Black, Uyless. Internet Telephony: Call Processing Protocols. Prentice Hall Series in Advanced
Communications Technologies. Upper Saddle River: Prentice, 2001.
---. Voice Over IP. 2nd ed. Prentice Hall Series in Advanced Communications Technologies. Upper
Saddle River: Prentice, 2002.
Basic Format | One Author | Two or Three Authors | More than Three Authors | Corporate Author | No Author | Reference Books | Work from a Collection

Two or Three Authors:

For books with two or three authors, list the authors in the order they appear on the title page of the book.  The first author will be listed in Last Name, First Name format.  The remaining authors are to be listed in First Name Last Name format.  Add a comma between the names.  If the names on the title page are editors, translators, or compilers, place a comma after the final name, then add the appropriate abbreviation (eds., trans., or comps.) (Gibaldi 154).

McManus, Jeffrey P., and Chris Kinsman. Visual Basic .NET Developer's Guide to ASP.NET, XML,
and ADO.NET. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2002.
Basic Format | One Author | Two or Three Authors | More than Three Authors | Corporate Author | No Author | Reference Books | Work from a Collection

More than Three Authors:

For books with more than three authors, you can list all of their names, or you can use just the name of the first author, followed by "et al." (the abbreviation for the Latin phrase "and others") (Gibaldi 154; Purdue 7).

Clements, Paul, et al. Documenting Software Architectures: Views and Beyond. SEI Series in
Software Engineering. Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2003.

Basic Format | One Author | Two or Three Authors | More than Three Authors | Corporate Author | No Author | Reference Books | Work from a Collection

Corporate Author:

If a book lists a corporate author (committee, association, commission, etc.), use the name of that corporation as the author.  Do not use any articles (A, An, or The) that may appear at the beginning of the corporate name (Gibaldi 157).

Syngress Media, Inc. CCSA Next Generation Check Point Certified Security Administration Study
Guide (Exam 156-210). New York: McGraw-Hill/Osborne, 2002.

Basic Format | One Author | Two or Three Authors | More than Three Authors | Corporate Author | No Author | Reference Books | Work from a Collection

No Author:

For books with no author, start the entry from the title of the book or essay/article.  Include the publication information for the source.

Current Biography. New York: Wilson, 1976.
If the book title begins with an article (A, An, or The), this can be left in the entry; however, in the Works Cited list, the article is to be ignored when the entries are being alphabetized (Gibaldi 163).


Basic Format | One Author | Two or Three Authors | More than Three Authors | Corporate Author | No Author | Reference Books | Work from a Collection

A Work from a Collection:

The following information should be included for citing a work (such as an essay, short story, or poem) from an anthology or book collection (Gibaldi 158-59; Purdue 7-8):

  1. Author of the essay, short story, poem, or other portion of the book (in Last Name, First Name format)
  2. Title of the essay, short story, etc. (in quotation marks)
  3. Title of the anthology or collection in which the work appears (underlined)
  4. Name of the editor, translator, or compiler of the book being cited (in First Name Last Name format; preceded by Ed., Trans., or Comp. as needed)
  5. Publication information (Place: Publisher, Year.)
  6. Page number(s) (followed by a period)
If the portion of the book being cited is a translation, list the name of the translator (preceded by the abbreviation Trans.) immediately after the title of the cited section.
Chacón, Eusebio. "Defending Cultural and Civil Rights."  Herencia: The Anthology of Hispanic
Literature of the United States.  Ed. Nicolás Kanellos.  New York: Oxford UP, 2002.

130-35.

Basic Format | One Author | Two or Three Authors | More than Three Authors | Corporate Author | No Author | Reference Books | Work from a Collection

Reference Books:

When citing a an article from a reference book that has had several editions or frequent updates, you do not need to supply the full publication information. Use the following format for the citation entry:

"Title of Article."  Title of Reference Book. Volume or Edition information. Year of Publication.
An article from a reference book usually will not be signed; if the article is signed, list the author at the beginning of the entry (in Last Name, First Name format).
"Madagascar."  The New Encyclopaedia Britannica.  Volume 23.  15th ed.  2002.
If the reference book being cited is not updated frequently (or consists of only one edition), provide the full publication information.  The name of the author of the article is listed first; the name of the editor of the reference work is to be listed immediately after the title of the book (preceded by the abbreviation ed., trans., or comp. as needed).  When available, edition information and the number of volumes in the work should be listed before the place of publication (Gibaldi 158, 160-61).
Lewis, David Levering.  "Harlem Renaissance."  Africana: The Encyclopedia of the African and
African American Experience.  Eds. Kwame Anthony Appiah and Henry Louis Gates, Jr. 

New York: Basic Civitas, 1999.

Basic Format | One Author | Two or Three Authors | More than Three Authors | Corporate Author | No Author | Reference Books | Work from a Collection