A Concise Guide to Documentation: MLA, APA, and Chicago

The nuts and bolts of documentation for the three most popular systems--MLA, APA, and CMS (Chicago Manual of Style)--laid out in an exceptionally clear and easy-to-follow format. Why consult multiple (and often lengthy) style guides when you can see the three most widely-used methods, side by side, in this slim, focused volume by Larson? The book rightly divides the documentation process into two parts: In-Text Citation and Bibliographic Citation. Each part starts with a brief section on General Principles and then proceeds to give numerous common examples, where the exact same citation is seen three different ways, once each for MLA, APA, and CMS. And at the end of the book's second part are complete sample bibliographic pages for each of the three systems: a "Works Cited" page for MLA, a "References" page for APA, and a "Notes" page for CMS. This text is time and classroom-tested through Larson's long experience as an instructor of English at the college level. He knows what writers need to know about documentation, and he knows how to communicate that in the clearest, most efficient way. If you are looking for a simple, one-volume source on documentation to take you through your college years and beyond, this book might be the only one you'll ever need.

Michael Larson teaches English at Minnesota State College - Southeast Technical, in Winona, Minnesota. He holds a Master of Fine Arts degree in Creative Writing and a Master of Arts degree in English Literature. He is the author of a book of poems, WHAT WE WISH WE KNEW, a chapbook of poems, THE LIGHT REMAINING, and two forthcoming textbooks, DURABLE DESIGN: CLASSICAL ORATION FOR SPEECHES AND ESSAYS and ENGLISH GRAMMAR TABLES: A CONCISE VISUAL REFERENCE. Mr. Larson is also the recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship in poetry, a Loft-McKnight fellowship in poetry, and an Iowa State Arts Board grant in fiction.