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Referencing guide at the University of Manchester: Modern Humanities Research Association MHRA

This referencing guide is designed to provide support for all referencing requirements at the University of Manchester

What is Modern Humanities Research Association MHRA?

The Modern Humanities Research Association (MHRA) is a United Kingdom-based international organisation that aims to encourage and promote advanced study and research of humanities.

The MHRA style is intended primarily for use in connection with the Modern Humanities Research Association’s own books and periodicals. This style is widely used by students and other authors, for editors, and publishers of texts written mainly in English.

Nota bene: This is predominantly a footnote or endnote style of referencing.

The information detailed within this webpage is based on the book:

MHRA style guide: a handbook for authors and editors.

Modern Humanities Research Association, MHRA Style Guide : A Handbook for Authors and Editors. ed. by Brian Richardson. 3rd edn, Modern Humanities Research Association Style Guide (London: Modern Humanities Research Association, 2013)
Also available at: http://www.mhra.org.uk/style

 

When referencing at University of Manchester

Whenever you paraphrase or quote a source or use the ideas of another person, you need to cite the source of the material.

It is vital to acknowledge your sources, both to improve the quality of your essay and to avoid plagiarism. This is discussed in more detail in the essay writing guide.

Most work adopting this style use the footnotes method and accompany this with a bibliography. Including only those sources cited in your work.

In your essay

Your essay should be referenced using footnotes (notes) and accompanied by a bibliography including only those works cited in your essay. The 'notes' should provide an accurate reference to any source you have quoted or paraphrased (id est the words or point of view of any author whose work you have used).

Footnotes (notes)

The footnotes should provide an accurate reference to any source you have quoted or paraphrased (i.e. the words or point of view of any authors whose work you have used); both the notes and the bibliography should be in the style recommended by the MHRA.

Most footnotes will give  references to  your  primary  texts,  monographs  (i.e. a book),  article  from academic journals,  or  essays from book-length  essay collections.

  • Insert a footnote marker after the full stop at the end of the sentence or after the word or phrase to which it relates to.
  • At the bottom of the page, note the footnote number and give the full citation.
  • Author names should be styled as 'forename' followed by 'surname'

    • John R Maddicott,

      Or

    • J.R. Maddicott

      if the forename is not known in full.

  • If there are three names in your reference list each one in the order they appear, for more than three list the first author followed by 'and others' .
  • Page numbers should be included at the end with the cited page number in parenthesis.
  • All footnotes end in a full stop.

1 Kevin Erhard and others, 'Professional Training in Creative Writing Is Associated with Enhanced Fronto-Striatal Activity in a Literary Text Continuation Task', NeuroImage, 100 (2014), 15-23 (19).

Or

1 K. Erhard and others, 'Professional Training in Creative Writing Is Associated with Enhanced Fronto-Striatal Activity in a Literary Text Continuation Task', NeuroImage, 100 (2014), 15-23 (19).

The use of 'Ibid' in footnotes

Ibid - from the latin ibidem meaning  'in the same place'.  You can use ibid if two or more consecutive citations come from the same source, to shorten your footnotes.

1 K. Erhard and others, 'Professional Training in Creative Writing Is Associated with Enhanced Fronto-Striatal Activity in a Literary Text Continuation Task', NeuroImage, 100 (2014), 17.

2 Ibid. p. 19.

3 Ibid. pp. 21-23.

Bibliography

At the end of your essay there should be a bibliography listing the materials that you have used.

  • Sources should be listed in alphabetical order according to the surname of the author or by title (if there is no author).
  • The first author name is given as 'surname, forename' with every subsequent author as 'forename, surname'.
  • If there are three names in your reference list each one in the order they appear, for more than three list the first author followed by 'and others'.
  • References within your bibliography should not end in a full stop.
  • The second line of every one thereafter should be indented.

Vitalaki, Elena, Elias Kourkoutas, and Angie Hart, 'Building Inclusion and Resilience in Students with and without Sen through the Implementation of Narrative Speech, Role Play and Creative Writing in the Mainstream Classroom of Primary Education', International Journal of Inclusive Education (2018), 1-14

Or

V. Elena, E. Kourkoutas, and A. Hart, 'Building Inclusion and Resilience in Students with and without Sen through the Implementation of Narrative Speech, Role Play and Creative Writing in the Mainstream Classroom of Primary Education', International Journal of Inclusive Education (2018), 1-14

Sources

Books

Citation order:
  • Author
  • Title - italicised
  • Edition (if not the first edition)
  • Place of publication: publisher, year of publication in parentheses
Footnote:

1Douglas Gray, The Oxford Companion to Chaucer,  (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003), p. 39.

Reference:

Gray, Douglas, The Oxford Companion to Chaucer (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003)

Book chapter (book section)

Citation order:
  • Author of the chapter
  • Title of the chapter - in single quotation marks
  • in
  • Title of book - italicised
  • ed. by - name of editor in forename (initials if full name not known) surname
  • Place of publication: publisher, year of publication in parentheses
  • Page numbers of chapter using prefix pp.
  • Page of the citation using the prefix p. in parentheses
Footnote:

2 Stephen Knight, 'The Voice of Labour in Fourteenth-Century English Literature', in The  Problem  of  Labour  in Fourteenth-Century England, ed. by P.  J.  P. Goldberg and W.  M.   Ormrod (Rochester, NY: Boydell and Brewer, 2000), pp. 101-22 (p. 102).

Reference:

Knight, Stephen, 'The Voice of Labour in Fourteenth-Century English Literature', in The  Problem  of  Labour  in Fourteenth-Century England, ed. by P.  J.  P. Goldberg and W.  M.   Ormrod (Rochester, NY: Boydell and Brewer, 2000), pp. 101-22

e-book

Citation order:
  • Author or editor
  • Title - italicised
  • Edition (if not the first edition)
  • Place of publication: publisher, year of publication in parentheses
  • in
  • Title of online collection (if known)
  • <URL>
  • [accessed - date]
Footnote:

3 Mark Bauerlein Literary Criticism: An Autopsy (Pennsylvania University of Pennsylvania Press 1997) in Critical Authors & Issues <https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt3fh8pb> [accessed 09 April 2018] p 74.

Reference:

Bauerlein, Mark, Literary Criticism: An Autopsy (Pennsylvania University of Pennsylvania Press 1997) in Critical Authors & Issues <https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt3fh8pb> [accessed 09 April 2018]

Film or broadcast

Citation order:
  • Title of film - italicised
  • dir. by - followed by forename surname
  • Distributor, year of release in parentheses
  • [on Medium] e.g. [on Blu-ray]
Footnote:

4 Man Bites, Dog dir. by Rémy Belvaux (London : Tartan Video, 2000) [on VHS].

Reference:

Man Bites Dog, dir. by Rémy Belvaux (London : Tartan Video, 2000) [on VHS]

Journal articles

Citation order:
  • Author
  • Title of the article - in single quotation marks
  • Title of the journal - italicised with capital first letters of all words except connecting words, such as: and, in of
  • Volume number
  • Year of publication in parentheses
  • Page numbers - Note also, however, that you do not use ‘p.’ or ‘pp.’ for the page numbers of journals
Footnote:

5 Christopher McGunnigle, 'My Own Vampire: The Metamorphosis of the Queer Monster in Francis Ford Coppola's Bram Stoker's Dracula', Gothic Studies, 7 (2005), 172-84 (79).

Reference:

McGunnigle, Christopher, 'My Own Vampire: The Metamorphosis of the Queer Monster in Francis Ford Coppola's Bram Stoker's Dracula', Gothic Studies, 7 (2005), 172-84

Journal article (online)

Citation order:
  • Author
  • Title of the article - in single quotation marks
  • Title of the journal with capital first letters of all words except connecting words e.g. and, in of
  • Volume number
  • Year of publication in parentheses
  • Page numbers - Note also, however, that you do not use ‘p.’ or ‘pp.’ for the page numbers of journals
  • <URL> or <DOI>
  • [accessed - date]
Footnote:

6 Geert De Wilde, 'The Stanza Form of the Middle English Lament for the Death of Edward I : A Reconstruction', Anglia - Zeitschrift für Englische Philologie, 123. 2 (2005), 230-45 (241) <https://hdl.handle.net/2160/36408> [accessed 4 March 2018].

Reference:

De Wilde, Geert, 'The Stanza Form of the Middle English Lament for the Death of Edward I : A Reconstruction', Anglia - Zeitschrift für Englische Philologie, 123. 2 (2005), 230-45 <https://hdl.handle.net/2160/36408> [accessed 4 March 2018]

Newspaper and Magazine articles

Citation order:
  • Reporter or Author
  • Title of the article - in single quotation marks
  • Title of the journal with capital first letters of all words except connecting words e.g. and, in of
  • Date
  • Page numbers - preceded by p.
Footnote:

7 Katharine Viner, 'Love, Loathing and Life with Ted Hughes', Guardian, 18 March 2000, p. 1.

Reference:

Viner, Katharine, 'Love, Loathing and Life with Ted Hughes', Guardian, 18 March 2000, p. 1

Online Media (e.g. YouTube)

Citation order:
  • Author
  • Title italisised
  • Type of source
  • Title of website
  • Date of Publication
  • <URL>
  • [accessed date]
Footnote:

8 Gabriel Dominato, Morceaux de conversation avec Jean-Luc Godard, online video recording, YouTube, 10 January 2013, <https://youtu.be/0keNMXK5nvw> [accessed 22 May 2018].

Reference:

Gabriel Dominato, Morceaux de conversation avec Jean-Luc Godard, online video recording, YouTube, 10 January 2013, <https://youtu.be/0keNMXK5nvw> [accessed 22 May 2018]

Plays

Citation order:
  • Reporter or Author
  • Title of the article - in single quotation marks
  • Title of the journal with capital first letters of all words except connecting words e.g. and, in of
  • Date
  • Page numbers - preceded by p.
Footnote:

9 Katharine Viner, 'Love, Loathing and Life with Ted Hughes', Guardian, 18 March 2000, p. 1.

Reference:

Viner, Katharine, 'Love, Loathing and Life with Ted Hughes', Guardian, 18 March 2000, p. 1

Theses

Citation order:
  • Author
  • Title of the thesis - in single quotation marks
  • Thesis type, University, year in parentheses
Footnote:

10 Noreen Doody, 'Severed Heads: The Influence of Oscar Wilde on W. B. Yeats' (unpublished doctoral thesis, Trinity College, 2001).

11 Sarah Hayley York, 'Suicide, Lunacy and the Asylum in Nineteenth-Century England' (unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Birmingham, 2009).

Reference:

Doody, Noreen, 'Severed Heads: The Influence of Oscar Wilde on W. B. Yeats' (unpublished doctoral thesis, Trinity College, 2001)

York, Sarah Hayley, 'Suicide, Lunacy and the Asylum in Nineteenth-Century England' (unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Birmingham, 2009)

Websites and blogs

Citation order:
  • Author
  • Title of the page - italicised
  • Year of publish or update in parentheses
  • <URL>
  • [accessed date]
Footnote:

11 Fiona Bailey, Kerouac's 'Lost' Book Published, Webpage, BBC News, (2011) <https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-15870925> [accessed 24 November 2011].

Reference:

Bailey, Fiona, Kerouac's 'Lost' Book Published, Webpage, BBC News, (2011) <https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-15870925> [accessed 24 November 2011]

Reference management software & MHRA

Modern Humanities Research Association MHRA-Footnote and MHRA (Author-Date) styles are both available through the EndNote programme.

EndNote Online is free web-based implementation of EndNote. Modern Humanities Research Association MHRA-Footnote and MHRA Manchester styles are both available through EndNote online.

Mendeley is a free reference manager and an academic social network. Manage your research, showcase your work, connect and collaborate with others.

Modern Humanities Research Association MHRA-Footnote and MHRA (Author-Date) styles are both available through Mendeley.

To quickly insert a footnote in word use Ctrl-Alt-F then insert your reference.

Further information

The Official MHRA Style Guideline can be found online and includes:

The Guide.

The complete text of the Style Guide is presented free online from the contents page below: or, for an overview, we also offer the Quick Guide online. The full Guide can also be bought as an inexpensive paperback, or downloaded free as a PDF. This text nevertheless remains subject to copyright, and should not be reproduced without permission.

Citation examples.

MHRA styled citations are used throughout the MHRA's online catalogue, with links to explanations. Here are: a typical monograph, a typical collected volume, a special number of a journal cited as a book, and a typical translation; and here are: an article in a journal, a chapter in an edited book, an article in a special number of a journal, and an article in an electronic journal.

Disclaimer

The information contained within these pages is intended as a general referencing guideline.

Please check with your supervisor to ensure that you are following the specific guidelines required by your school.

Creative Commons Licence This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International Licence.