What is MLA Format Website Citation? MLA format website citation is the Modern Language Association's format for citing web sources, such as web pages, online magazines, blog posts, etc.
There are three types citation that can occur when using this format: entire website, page from the website, and blog post.
The Modern Language format dictates that you provide the name of the website author, the website name, the site sponsor, website creation date, the nature of the site and the website access date.
The difference between MLA format for websites and the general MLA format citation guidelines is that websites, unlike books, often change faster than book versions do.
In some cases, books stay the same (a few versions in a few years), but websites could completely change by the time one accesses the site.
Also, websites are easily created and can easily fade out of existence in a way that printed sources such as journals and newspapers do not.
There are other factors that influence the need to offer the date of access: for one, an individual could change his or her position on a given issue.
If one accesses the site in August, but the individual changes his or her view earlier in the same year (or earlier), the website visitor might be citing an out-of-date source, or one that is now irrelevant.
MLA format website citation is set up to handle these problems.
When citing website pages, as opposed to the entire website, one must supply the same information required for website citation.
Like MLA references, the writer would give the author's last name, first name, the page title, source title, the date the site is created, and the day he or she accesses the site page (s).
When citing a blog post, one should use the author's last and first name (as he or she would any MLA reference) followed by the title of the post, the date the site was created, as well as the date on which the individual visits the site.
There are other complex situations surrounding website citation such as a missing publisher or missing creation date.
In such cases, one should write the notation "n.
d.
," meaning "no date.
" The Benefits of MLA Format Website Citation One of the benefits of MLA format website citation is that it opens access to the Internet as a valid, valuable academic resource.
Prior to the MLA website citation rules, the Internet (with the exception of printed sources that were also electronic) were not considered academic in any form.
Today, even sites like Wikipedia.
com can be considered as websites with valuable academic content on its pages.
Blog posts, the musings of individuals, can also be seen as semi-academic in form.
Website citation has made it easy for students to promote their own ideas and thoughts about contemporary issues and even problems in education.
Students can now literally become "scholars" before being heralded as such.
Another benefit of MLA format citation is that through the creation of website citation, not just students, but any of the hoi polloi, can become "experts" on any given subject.
This seems to rather "democratize" the academic world, where now, even professors must pay attention to blog writers who have no degree but a site on which they provide their own personal ideas.
Website citation, then, is creating a "reversal of fortunes" on the World Wide Web.