Article in a Magazine
MLA:
Considine, J. D. “Radical Shriek.” Guitar World. Dec. 1999: 62+.
[author by last name.] [“article title.”] [magazine title.] [issue date:] [first page number and “+.”]APA:
Considine, J. D. (1999, December). Radical shriek. Guitar World. 62-68, 210-214.
[author by last name.] [(issue date).] [article title, no quotation marks] [magazine title,] [full page numbers.]Chicago:
9. Considine, “Radical Shriek,” 212.
[fn. #.] [author last name, “title,” page quoted.]
[Shortened Chicago reference; see More Notes on Chicago Style for more information.]
Articles can appear in many sources, including books, journals, magazines, newspapers, and websites. Knowing which type you’re using matters both for how you cite the information and for how you use the source to develop your argument.
In the context of research writing, the word “magazine” indicates a publication that comes out on a regular schedule (usually weekly or monthly, but sometimes quarterly) with a common publisher or editorial board. Journals come out on similar schedules, but differ in several key ways from magazines. One way to distinguish a magazine from a journal is that most magazines accept color advertisements and are printed on glossy paper.
When developing your research, you need to know whether you’re using a scholarly journal or a popular magazine because these two kinds of sources convey different levels of expertise, depending on the topic. See the discussion of Scholarly vs. Popular Sources for more information. When compiling a Works Cited or list of References, the distinction between journals and magazines matters because there are different conventions for how each should be listed.
The listing for an article in a magazine begins with the name of the article’s author and the title of the article. (In APA style, the publication year appears between the author and title.) These are followed by the title of the magazine. Give next the date of publication (exact date if it’s monthly or biweekly; month and year if it’s monthly) and the page numbers, if they run consecutively. If the article skips pages and is continued later in the magazine, MLA style calls for just the first page number and a plus sign; APA style requires listing all the page numbers.
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