CRLS Research Guide
Making a Works Cited
Tip Sheet 19Ask these questions:
What is it?
A Works Cited is an alphabetical list of the sources (also called
"works") you used in the body of your project.
Where does it go?
It should be the last page in your project.
Why do I need to do it?
When you do a research project you must give credit to the sources from which
you found the material you used directly in your project. This is called
citing your sources. You must do it whenever you use a complete piece of
someone else's material (like a quotation, a picture, a song, statistical data,
or even someone else's idea that you put into your own words) and you must do it
even if you only use a recognizable part of that material. If you do not cite your
sources, you are committing plagiarism by calling someone else's work your own.
For additional information on citing sources, see the MLA Handbook for Writers
of Research Papers, available in the Pearl K. Wise Library at CRLS.
Isn't this a Bibliography?
People use the terms interchangeably, but they are actually different. A bibliography
is a list of related reading material that your reader can look for if they want
to do more reading on your topic. A Works Cited is a list of only those sources
from which you used borrowed material in your project, and which you cited with
parenthetical documentation within your project. It is a fine difference. If your
teacher asks for a bibliography, give them a Works Cited. It is probably what they
meant to ask for.