The MHRA referencing style is set by the Modern Humanities Research Association. This guide is based on the 3 rd edition of the MHRA style guide.
MHRA uses a footnote citation system.
In the text, a reference number is added in superscript 1 after the information or the end of the sentence, after any punctuation. The reference numbers increase in sequence throughout the assignment (or chapter of a long piece of work).
Johnson expresses her disgust as the ‘complete breakdown of moral values’. 1
There is little to distinguish between the two arguments (as Simmons states on several occasions), 2 but it might be worth considering a different approach to this quandary.
Full details of the source are given in a reference in a footnote at the bottom of the page it's cited on. Include the page number(s) if you're quoting or referring to specific information.
The information to include in footnote references depends on the type of source - see examples for details.
8 Charles Nicholl, The Reckoning: The Murder of Christopher Marlowe (London: Vintage, 1992), p. 72.A bibliography is a list of all sources cited that appears at the end of the document. You usually don't need to include a bibliography in assignments - however, a bibliography is needed for some assignments, such as the Dissertation, so check your assessment instructions.
In the footnote, names are given in Forename Surname order:
1 Anthony Grafton, The Footnote: A Curious History (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. 1999), pp.25-29.
In a bibliography, the first author's surname is given first in the bibliography to allow for alphabetic listing:
If a source has one, two or three authors or editors, include all of their names in full, in the order they appear on the source.
H. Munro Chadwick and N. Kershaw Chadwick, The Growth of Literature, 3 vols (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1932– 40; repr. 1986), i, p. xiii.
For a source with four or more authors or editors, give the name of the first author followed by 'and others'.
If you refer to the same work on more than one occasion, you have three options, depending on context.
You can use the Latin abbreviation ‘ibid.’. This means ‘in the same place’, and you footnotes might look like this:
1 Heidi J. Holder, ‘Between Fiction and Reality: Synge’s Playboy and its Audience’, Journal of Modern Literature, 14: 4 (1988), 527-42 (p. 532).
2 Ibid., p. 528.
Here you are free to abbreviate the original reference to something intelligible to the reader, as in the following example:
1 Heidi J. Holder, ‘Between Fiction and Reality: Synge’s Playboy and its Audience’, Journal of Modern Literature, 14: 4 (1988), 527-42 (p. 532).
Then after some other references:
14 Holder, ‘Between Fiction and Reality’, p. 528.If you frequently refer to the same source, eg, when quoting from the same play throughout an essay, you can signal in the first footnote that you will be including an ‘in-text’ references for all subsequent mentions:
1 Caryl Churchill, Far Away (London: Nick Hern, 2003), p. 15. Subsequent references will appear as a bracketed ‘FA’ followed by a page number.
A subsequent example in the essay may look like this:
The play opens with a note of disturbance when Joan says ‘I can’t sleep’ (FA 3).There is no longer need for a footnote in this case.
It is important to use quality sources to support your arguments and so you should consider carefully the value of using any source when you cannot identify its author. For online sources, look carefully for named contributors, such as in the ‘about us’ sections. For printed material, try to locate authors in the publication/ copyright information which is often on the inside cover of a book or back page of a report.
If you can't find the author information, you can use ‘Anon.’ in place of a name.
Knowing when a source was created, published, or last updated is important as this helps you to determine the relevance and reliability of the source. Sacred and classical works where dates are not given (precisely) are, however, also commonly used. For online sources, look carefully for created and/ or last updated dates on the page(s).
If you can't find a publication date, use ‘n.d.’ for no date in place of the year.
Quotations are word-for-word text included in your work and they must always be copied with exact accuracy. This includes, for instance, precise transcription of the smallest details of both punctuation and typography (the use of italics, say, or capitalisation, etc.). Do not italicise quotations unless they appear in italics in the original. Quotations should always be carefully identified as quotations.
If your chosen quotation is relatively short (i.e., no more than two lines in length), use a brief phrase within your paragraph or sentence to introduce the quotation before including it inside single quotation marks ‘ ’. For longer quotations, you should indent the quotation in full, so that it appears as an indented paragraph of its own, and no quotation marks are needed around the text. A footnote should follow both forms of quotation.
For example, you may find an interesting quotation from a named person in a newspaper article, interview or other published material. In this case, the person quoted is different from the person writing the source itself.
In-text:
As Ralph Fiennes noted, when discussing Richard III: ‘It’s quite rare that you actually are close to a political crisis, political uncertainty’. 1
Footnote:
1 Ralph Fiennes, quoted in Mark Brown, ‘Ralph Fiennes: Michael Gove is just like Richard III’, The Guardian, 19 July 2016.
Quoting from a single character’s speech involves simply putting the line in single quotation marks. When quoting dialogue, you should include the characters’ names, as in the following example:
Anna: I don’t kiss strange men.This would then be followed by a footnote.
When quoting from a play with line numbers, such as a play by Shakespeare, include the line number in the footnote (in the form: p. x, l. y). For example:
MACBETH Prithee peace:
I dare do all that may become a man,
Who dares more is none.
LADY MACBETH What beast was’t then
That made you break this enterprise to me?
When you durst do it, then you were a man;
And to be more than what you were, you would
Be so much more the man.
(Macbeth, I.7.46–51) 7
7 William Shakespeare, Macbeth, ed. by Nicholas Brooke (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990), i.7.46-51
When you want to cite a comment about one author's work quoted in another author's work.
Secondary referencing should be avoided as far as possible and the original source consulted and cited. If it is essential to use a secondary reference follow these guidelines:
In-text:
Abbott has stated that John Clare wrote more poetry early in the day. 1
Footnote:
1 Colleer Abbott, The Life and Letters of George Darley, Poet and Critic, 2nd edn (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1967), p.59, quoted in Paul Chirico, John Clare and the Imagination of the Reader (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007), p.47.
Bibliography:
Note: Only list the source that you have actually read in your bibliography.
