Organization Websites (Such As Universities)
MLA:
Martin, Patrick. “Bush Campaign Ads Provoke Protests from Families of September 11
[author] [“section or page title”]
Victims.” 8 Mar, 2004. World Socialist Web Site. 11 Oct. 2004 <http://www.wsws.org/
[posting date.] [organization name.] [date of access] [<URL.>]
articles/2004/mar2004/bush-m08.shtml>.APA:
Martin, P. (2004, March 8). Bush campaign ads provoke protests from families of
[author.] [(posting date).] [page title.]
September 11 victims. Retrieved October 11, 2004, from the World Socialist Web Site:
[Retrieved date of access,] [from organization name:]
http://www.wsws.org/ articles/2004/mar2004/bush-m08.shtml.
[URL.]Chicago:
20. Martin, “Bush Campaign Ads.”
[fn. #.] [author last name, title.]
[Shortened Chicago reference; see More Notes on Chicago Style for more information.]
[Note: In the Bibliography, Chicago style does not generally include date of access.]
Many organizations maintain websites hosting information about the organization or about the field that they work in. Some examples include commercial companies, universities, non-profit organizations, political groups, and government agencies. The reliability of these websites varies widely, as these organizations often use their websites to promote specific causes and may therefore emphasize only the facts and ideas that support their goals. See Scholarly vs. Popular Sources for more information.
But sometimes these organizations have the most comprehensive coverage of topics that pertain to them. For certain topics, it’s also useful to examine what the interested parties say, even if you must remember to balance it with research into other points of view. If you are conscientious about identifying who sponsors the site, your reader will be better prepared to examine the material you present. Websites hosted by university departments and programs would generally be considered reliable sources, especially in their areas of scholarly expertise. (More caution is warranted when the site discusses politics or issues of university governance. Be careful, too, to distinguish sites created by individual faculty members from those sponsored by the larger institution.)
Whenever possible, you should identify the author of the material you use from a website. Some pages you access will have separate titles or sub-titles, which can be used like the titles of an article in a journal. This title is followed by the name of the main website, if there is one, and the name of the sponsoring organization. After this comes the full URL for the material you’re using.The final item is the date that you accessed the site.
Note: It’s sometimes hard to find the author of material on an organization website. In that case, list by the title of the site—if there is one—or by the name of the organization. If you can’t find any of this information, even after searching through the site’s links, you may be using a private website or topic website, and should review the information for those sources.
Note, also: You may notice that listing Internet sources often takes more time and care than listing print sources. Since the authorship and location of Web sources are harder to establish, readers need even more information in order to assess sources and to retrieve them for further study. See Special Demands of Internet Sources for more information.
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