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MLA Style: MLA Annotated Bibliography

Annotated Bibliography - 9th Edition

Your professor may assign an annotated bibliography in MLA style. The annotated bibliography contains descriptive or evaluative comments about your sources. Each citation should adhere to MLA guidelines. Begin your comments immediately following the citation.

Your instructor may request an annotated bibliography in order to evaluate the types of sources you are selecting for your research. The annotations should show that you have carefully conducted your research and critically analyzed the information you will use to write your paper. The good news is that the 'Works Cited' list will be almost complete before you begin writing. Below is an example of a full annotated bibliography in MLA style that can be downloaded.

The Ninth Edition of the MLA Handbook introduces a brief section about the annotated bibliography. In terms of formatting the requirement is to indent annotations an inch from the start of the bibliographic entry, which helps avoid confusion with the half-inch hanging indentation of long entries.

Example of formatting:

 

Last Name, First Name. "Title of Article." Title of Journal, vol. #, no. #, date of publication. Name of Digital Platform, URL/DOI. Second line Second line Second line Second line Second line Second line Second line Second line Second line Second line Second line Second line Second line Third line Third line Third line Third line Third line Third line.

Annotation text Annotation text Annotation text Annotation text Annotation text Annotation text Annotation text Annotation text Annotation text Annotation text Annotation text Annotation text Annotation text Annotation text Annotation text Annotation text.

Goals of annotations are:

  • description of sources
  • evaluation of sources
  • description and evaluation of sources

Recommendations of what annotations should NOT contain include:

  • minor details
  • evidence
  • quotation of the source author
  • recount of steps in an argument

Annotations may contain either succint phrases or complete sentences, and consist of one paragraph only or multiple paragraphs (in which case indentation is required, but not extra space between paragraphs). The suggestion is to follow the instructor's guidelines on annotation length (one or more paragraphs) and structure (phrase-based or sentence-based).

Titles for the page can be:

  • Annotated Bibliography
  • Annotated List of Works Cited

Organization of entries can be:

  • by author or title (as in a regular Work Cited)
  • by publication date
  • by subject