Formatting your Essay is an Essential Element When you Submit your Essay
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Formatting your essay is an essential element when you submit your essay
While writing your essay refer to the instructions that your own lecturer requests you as there are different styles of formats and each style has it own guidelines. Following are few fundamental guidelines of commonly used styles that will cater you in formatting your essay easily.
MLA Formatting
MLA (Modern Language Association) is conventionally used to write papers within arts and humanities. Type your essay with a legible font on white 8.5 x 11-inch paper using double-space with 1″ margins on all sides. You may choose any font but it should give a contrast between the regular and italics type of style. The font size should be 12pt, leave only one space after periods or other punctuation marks. Indent the first line of the paragraphs one half-inch from the left margin. Create header that numbers all the pages in the upper-hand corner, one half inch from the top and emerge with the right margin. Use italics throughout your essay for the tittles of longer works and only when necessary. Include endnotes to separate the page from cited page.
APA Formatting
APA (American psychological association) is most commonly used format within the social sciences. Your essay should be typed on an 8.5″ x 11″ sized paper, double-spaced with 1″ margins on all sides. APA recommends using 12 pt. font size and Times New Roman font. At the top of every page you must create a page header/running head is a diminished version of your paper which cannot exceed 50 characters including spacing and punctuation. Your essay should also be bifurcated in four categories: the tittle page, introduction, body and references.
Harvard formatting
Harvard style of format allows you to use and also acknowledge other people’s information and ideas in your own work. This style ensures people who read your work can locate the same source of information that you found helpful which reduces the risk of plagiarism. Consistency is important when using the Harvard style as all information sources of the same type should be treated in the same way. Your essay should be typed in a legible font (Times New Roman/ Arial/ Calibri) on a standard sized paper, with the font size 12pt. While using the Harvard formatting style it requires a very specific cover page. About center of the page is the tittle of the paper in capital letters following this after three lines down is the name of the author which is not in capital letters. After four lines down put the name of the class, and, on the line after that, the name of the professor. Mention the name of the school in the next line, then the city and state where it is located, lastly the date.
| Point of difference | APA (American psychological association) | MLA (Modern Language Association) | Harvard |
| Font | Times New Roman | Times New Roman/ Arial/ Calibri | Times New Roman/ Arial/ Calibri |
| Font size | 12 pt. | 12 pt. | 12 pt. |
| Margin | 1″ | 1″ | 1″ |
| Spacing | double-spacing on title page and body text. | double-spacing on header and body text | No specifications |
| Tittle |
upper and lowercase letters centered in the upper half of the page; not more than 12 words; no abbreviations.
|
centered title at the beginning of the essay. |
a partial title on the top right expressing the main idea in the essay. |
| Title page |
Title of the paper,
The author’s name, and
Institutional affiliation
|
Not required unless specifically requested. |
Title is mentioned halfway down the page,
(After three lines) Authors Name, (four lines down) Name of the Class, Professors Name, University name City and state, Date
|
| Header |
Top left of every page
|
Top right of every page along with authors name.
|
a short description of the title and a sequential the page number exactly after five spaces from the title.
|
| Major paper sections |
Title Page, Abstract, Main Body, and References
|
Title Page, Abstract, Main Body, and References
|
Title Page, Abstract, Main Body, and References
|
| Usage | To write papers within social sciences. | To write papers within humanities. | No specific field of academics. |