How to Cite Books and Articles in LSA Style

Linguistic Society of America Guide to References and Citations

Mar 31, 2009 Heather Marie Kosur

The following article describes and provides examples for citing books and journal articles using the LSA style sheet.

Many researchers and writers in the languages and linguistics come from English studies backgrounds, which use the MLA Style Manual to format works cited pages and parenthetical citations. However, academic and professional writers in the area of language and linguistics must adhere to the LSA Style Sheet in formatting proper references. Although MLA and LSA styles are very similar, significant differences exist that serious linguistic writers must learn.

General Information on LSA Citations

  • Place the bibliography of cited texts at the end of document.
  • Use the heading References at the beginning of the bibliography.
  • Arrange the list of cited text alphabetically by author surname.
  • Arrange multiple works by one author in ascending chronological order.
  • Use lowercase suffixes to distinguish multiple works by one author from the same year.
  • Do not use initials with authors or editors unless initials are already used.
  • Capitalize only the first letter, the first letter after colons, and proper nouns in titles.

Parenthetical Citations

The templates for citing works in the text of the document are:

  • (Author surname publication year:page numbers)
  • (publication year:page numbers)

For example:

  • According to Paul J. Hopper (1999:31)...
  • Prepositions without objects are called marooned prepositions (Hopper 1999:121).

Citing Books With One Author

The template for citing books with one author is:

  • Author surname, Author first name and/or Middle name and/or Initials. Publication year. Book title. City, and/or Country of publication: Publisher.

For example:

  • Dikken, Marcel den. 1995. Particles: On the syntax of verb-particle, triadic, and causative constructions. New York: Oxford University Press.
  • Hopper, Paul J. 1999. A short course in grammar. New York: W.W. Norton & Company.
  • Newmeyer, Frederick J. 1998. Language form and language function. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press.

Citing Books With Two or More Authors

The template for citing books with two or more authors is:

  • Author surname, Author first name and/or Middle name and/or Initials, and Author surnames, Author first names and/or Middle names and/or Initials. Publication year. Book title. City, and/or Country of publication: Publisher.

For example:

  • Fischer, Olga, Ans Van Kemenade, Willem Koopman, and Wim van der Wurff. 2000. The syntax of early English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Justice, Laura M. and Helen K. Ezell. 2002. The syntax handbook: Everything you learned about syntax…but forgot. Eau Claire, Wisconsin: Thinking Publications.
  • Rivero, María Luisa and Angela Ralli. 2001. Comparative syntax of Balkan languages. Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press.

Citing Chapters, Essays, and Articles in Books

The template for citing chapters, essays, and articles in books is:

  • Author surname, Author first name and/or Middle name and/or Initials. Publication year. Chapter, essay, or article title. Book title, ed. by Editor first name and/or Middle name and/or Initials and Editor surname, page numbers. City, and/or Country of publication: Publisher.

For example:

  • Giusti, Giuliana. 2002. The functional structure of noun phrases: A bare phrase structure approach. Functional structure in DP and IP, ed. by Guglielmo Cinque, 54-90. Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press.
  • Rizzi, Luigi. 1996. Residual verb second and the wh-criterion. Parameters and functional heads: Essays in comparative syntax, ed. by Adriana Belletti and Luigi Rizzi, 63-90. New York: Oxford University Press.
  • Tsimpli, Ianthi Maria. 1995. Focusing in modern Greek. Discourse configurational languages, ed. by Katalin É. Kiss, 176-206. New York: Oxford University Press.

Citing Journal Articles With One Author

The template for citing journal articles with one author is:

  • Author surname, Author first name and/or Middle name and/or Initials. Publication year. Article title. Journal title volume number.page numbers.

For example:

  • Breban, Tine. 2008. Grammaticalization, subjectification and leftward movement of English adjectives of difference in the noun phrase. Folia Linguistica 42.259-306.
  • Gaatone, David. 2007. Intensity markers and verbal expressions: Some reflections. Travaux de Linguistique 55.93-105.
  • Wagner, Michael. 2007. A note on stress in intransitives in English. Snippets 16.19-20.

Citing Journal Articles With Two or More Authors

The template for citing journal articles with two or more authors is:

  • Author surname, Author first name and/or Middle name and/or Initials, and Author surnames, Author first names and/or Middle names and/or Initials. Publication year. Article title. Journal title volume number.page numbers.

For example:

  • Gardner, Dee and Mark Davies. 2007. Pointing out frequent phrasal verbs: A corpus-based analysis. TESOL Quarterly 41.339-359.
  • Inanoglu, Zeynep and Steve Young. 2009. Data-driven emotion conversion in spoken English. Speech Communication 51.268-283.
  • Olmos, Susana and Aoife Ahern. 2009. Contrast and prepositional attitude: A relevance theoretic analysis of contract connectives in Spanish and English. Lingua 119.51-66.

Writers of essays, articles, and books in the field of language and linguistics can correctly cite books and journal articles by following these templates and examples of the LSA Style Sheet.

Sources

"Language Style Sheet." Language: Journal of the Linguistics Society of America. 2009. Linguistic Society of America. 30 Mar. 2009.

The copyright of the article How to Cite Books and Articles in LSA Style in Resources for Writers is owned by Heather Marie Kosur. Permission to republish How to Cite Books and Articles in LSA Style in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.