How to Credit Authors and Contributors

The author is the person or group who created the source.

Single and Multiple Authors (pp. 111-13)

Citation Maker has fields for an author's first, middle, and last names. Enter that information as found on the source. Citation Maker will add the correct formatting, such as reversing the order of the names.

     1 author: Twain, Mark.
     2 authors: Jones, Alan J., and Julio Lopez.
     3 or more authors -- only list the first author: Johnson, Amanda Michelle, et al.

No Author (p. 108)

When a work is published without an author’s name, do not list the author as Anonymous. Leave the Author field blank instead. 

Group as Author (pp. 119-21)

If an author is a group, organization, or agency, use the “Corporation or Organization as author” option in most templates. If that option is not available, list the group's name in the box called Last Name.

• When a group is both the author and publisher, skip the Author box and only list the group in the Publisher box.
• If the author is a division or committee of an organization, enter the division or committee as the Author and the organization as the Publisher.
  
       Ex. for the American Association of School Librarians, a division of the American Library Association
  
            Author: American Association of School Librarians
            Publisher: American Library Association
  
  
• If the author is a government agency, enter the agency's name as it is listed on your source.
  
       Ex: U.S. House of Representatives
       Ex: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
  
  
• If a group's name begins with "The," do not include "The" when listing their name.

Online Username or Handle (p. 118)    

• If an author’s online username differs from their real name, provide the username in square brackets after the real name. 

Ex: Fogarty, Mignon [@GrammarGirl]

• If the username and account name are similar (such as @BarackObama), you can omit the username if you include the URL of the source in the citation.

Ex: Obama, Barack 

• If only the username is known, provide it, but do not enclose it in square brackets.

Ex: @BookReader14

• Citation Maker provides text boxes for both real and usernames when they are typically used. If there is not a separate text box for usernames, and…
• …if you know the real name, enter the username in square brackets in the Middle Name text box, adding it after the middle name or initial if there is one.
• …if you do not know the real name, enter the username into the Last Name text box, and do not enclose it in square brackets.

Pseudonym (pp. 114-17)

Some authors use a pseudonym (pronounced: sue-duh-nim), which is a name other than their real name. This can also be called a pen name or stage name.

• If the pseudonym is made up of a first and last name, enter it as you would any author.

Ex: Twain, Mark

• Otherwise, enter the entire pseudonym in the box called Last Name.

Ex: Film Crit Hulk
Ex: Lady Gaga

• If a pseudonym is not well known and if you know the person's real name, include it in parentheses after the pseudonym.

Ex: Handler, Daniel [Lemony Snicket]

• Citation Maker provides text boxes for both real and pseudonyms when they are typically used. If there is not a separate text box for a pseudonym, and…
• …if you know the real name, enter the pseudonym in square brackets in the Middle Name text box, adding it after the middle name or initial if there is one.
• …if you do not know the real name, enter the pseudonym into the Last Name text box, and do not enclose it in square brackets.
  
  

Titles and Suffixes (pp. 49-50)

• If a suffix is included at the end of the name, include it in the citation.
  
  
  • Do this by adding a comma and the suffix after the name entered in the Middle Name field or to the end of the First Name field if there is no middle name.

    Ex. for Martin Luther King, Jr.:  King, Martin Luther, Jr.

• • Do not use a comma before a suffix that is a number.

    Ex. for John D. Rockefeller IV:  Rockefeller, John D. IV

• If a person's title or degree is listed, do not include it in the citation.

Ex. for Neil deGrasse Tyson, PhD:  Tyson, Neil deGrasse
Ex. for Sir Anthony Hopkins:  Hopkins, Anthony

Contributors (pp. 145-54)

In some templates, Citation Maker will let you give credit to more people than just the author of a source. These other contributors are either important to your project or are needed to identify the source. Citation Maker will let you choose the contributor's role, such as director or performer.

Works Cited List: Multiple Entries from Same Author (pp. 221-24)

When you cite multiple sources from the same author, only list the full author's name in the first entry. For the following entries, use three dashes in place of the author's name. Citation Maker cannot do this for you, so you will need to make that change on the works cited list that it produces. Ask your teacher whether you need to do this.

Simon, Seymour. Planet Mars. Seastar Books, 2008.

---. Stars. Rev. ed., Smithsonian, 2006.

---. The Universe. Rev. ed., Smithsonian, 2006.

Thompson, Stan. The Big Bang Theory. Random House, 2014.

Resources

MLA Handbook. 9th ed., Modern Language Association of America, 2021.

The MLA Style Center: Writing Resources from the Modern Language Association. Modern Language Association of America, 2021, style.mla.org.