MLA Works Cited - Article from a Database

Students frequently ask how to cite web publications in their Works Cited.  The following is a basic MLA-style entry for a scholarly journal article found on an article database (remember the hanging indent):

Examples:

Deresiewicz, William.  “The End of Solitude.”  Chronicle of Higher Education 55 (2009): n. pag.  Academic OneFile.  Web.  1 Dec. 2010.

Lepage, John Louis.  “Sylvester’s Du Bartas and the Metaphysical Androgyny of Opposites.”  English Literary History 51 (1984): 621-644.  JSTOR.  Web.  7 Nov. 2010.

Please note, you should always evaluate the credibility of your source before you use it.  If you use an article from JSTOR or similar types of databases, you can limit your searches to peer-reviewed articles only

Resources

Gibaldi, Joseph.  MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers. 7^th ed.  New York: MLA, 2009.

I find Concordia University’s guide to MLA style helpful.  See their entry Article in a Journal.

Neither...nor

Recently, a friend (whose first language is not English) said to me, “nor the coffee nor the tea are very good here.”  It was easy enough to understand what he was saying, but his expression prompted this post because it contained two errors that I sometimes find in my students’ work.

First, he was relying on a negation that is not usually found in standard written English.  In French we could say “ni l’un ni l’autre” (literally “nor one nor the other”).  However, “nor…nor” in English is chiefly poetic.  We usually use “neither…nor” to negate two options:

Option 1: The coffee is not very good here.

Option 2: The tea is not very good here.

Option 1 & 2 together: Neither the coffee nor the tea is very good here.

Second, when each one of the two options is singular, we use a singular verb with “neither…nor.”  In this case, coffee is singular and tea is singular.  Think of each sentence individually and use the verb from one of those sentences:

The coffee is not very good here.

The tea is not very good here.

Neither the coffee nor the tea is very good here.

If one option is singular and the other is plural, the verb agrees with the subject closest to the verb.

The coffee is not very good here.

The biscuits are not very good here.

Neither the coffee nor the biscuits are very good here.

Further, “neither…nor” should be used only with two options.  We usually write “neither A nor B,” not “neither A, B, C, nor D.” 

Despite the general truth of these rules, the OED provides some famous exceptions.  For example, Shakespeare has “nor…nor” and “neither A, B, C, nor D” in Measure for Measure:

             Thou hast nor youth nor age,
But, as it were, an after-dinner's sleep,
Dreaming on both; for all thy blessed youth
Becomes as aged, and doth beg the alms
Of palsied eld; and when thou art old and rich,
Thou hast neither heat, affection, limb, nor beauty,
To make thy riches pleasant. What's yet in this
That bears the name of life? Yet in this life
Lie hid moe thousand deaths: yet death we fear,
That makes these odds all even. (III, i, 32-41)

Resources

The Writing Center at The University of Wisconsin Madison has a good page on subject-verb agreement: there you can find examples of “neither…nor.”  Numbers 4, 5, and 6 of Capital Community College’s Subject-Verb Agreement page provides some practical and helpful examples.

Proprofs has a quiz for neither/nor and either/or.

Writingcare has a pretty good video clip explaining neither/nor and either/or:

 

Word Processing

A student recently asked me how to save time and finish assignments on time.  One simple answer is to learn how to type.  A lot of time is lost word processing documents.  Do the math for a 1000 word essay:

    1000 words      = 25 minutes of typing alone

40 words/minute 

    1000 words      = 100 minutes of typing alone

10 words/minute 

Learn how to type: it's a life skill in today’s society.   

There are quite a few websites that offer free typing tutorials.  I like Sense-lang.  It has typing tutorials that help you to learn touch typing and a number of games to help improve typing.  You can also try FreeTypingGame.

Complement and Compliment

When you “complement” (with an “e”), you add to or complete something:

The raspberry jam really complements the peanut butter in this sandwich.

(The raspberry jam in combination with the peanut butter makes this sandwich better.)

When you “compliment” (with an “i”), you flatter someone or something:

The raspberry jam often compliments the peanut butter.  The other day I heard it say, “Peanut butter, you sure are the smoothest and creamiest spread I have ever seen.”

(The raspberry jam speaks with the peanut butter and makes it feel good about itself.)

Resources

Paul Brians’s Common Errors in English Usage has an extensive list of errors that is worth perusing.  At the bottom of the Oxford Dictionary’s definition for “complement,” there is also a good explanation of the difference between “complement” and “compliment.”

Proprofs has a good quiz.

Not Only Spell Check

Too many students rely on spell check as their final editing tool.  Spell check is only a beginning.  It will not identify all words spelled incorrectly, especially if the words are real. For example, this sentence makes it past spell check:

“There wear too special affects that blue me away.”

(“There were two special effects that blew me away.”)

I recently asked my students to submit some errors (real or fictional) that made it past spell check:  This one came from a “Hollywood and History” assignment on Remember the Titans:

“There was no Vagina High School Hall of Fame in 1971—although it does exist today.”

Another student suggested the reason why spell check is not more efficient:

“If their where no eras, Mike wood bee out of wok.”

You can avoid such errors by having friends read your work.  

Resources

Purdue OWL Writing Lab and The University of North Carolina have good pages on editing and proofreading.