How to Credit Publishers

“The publisher is the entity primarily responsible for producing the work or making it available to the public.” Sometimes there is no publisher, or it may not need to be included. See the Omit the Publisher section below (pp. 164-65).

Listing the Publisher’s Name (p. 172)

Enter a publisher's name in full, as presented on the source, with the following exceptions:

  • Omit business words such as Company (Co.), Corporation (Corp.), Incorporated (Inc.), and Limited (Ltd.). Also omit any initial article (A, An,The).
  • For academic presses (related to universities), replace University Press with UP. If the words are separated by other words or appear alone, replace them with U and P.

Harvard University Press => Harvard UP
University of Chicago Press => U of Chicago P
MIT Press => MIT P

  • When Press is part of the publisher's name and the press is not associated with a university, keep Press in the name. 
  • Change an ampersand or a plus sign in a publisher’s name to this: and.

Farrar & Rinehart => Farrar and Rinehart


More Than One Publisher (p. 170)

  • If the two or more named organizations seem equally responsible for the work, separate the names with a forward slash ( / ) in the citation.

Parkwood Entertainment / Columbia Records      

  • If one of the organizations had primary responsibility, cite just that one organization.

Films and Television Series (p. 168)

  • They are often produced and distributed by several companies.
  • Select the company that is most prominently displayed or, if known, the one that had primary overall responsibility – either the production company that made the show or the network that broadcast it.
  • You also have the option to list both the production company and the broadcast network. 

Zenith Productions / ABC Studios

Websites and Blogs (p. 167)

  • Websites can be published by individuals or different types of organizations and companies. 
  • The publisher’s name may be found on the bottom of the page by the copyright date or on an “about” page.


When an Organization or Government Agency is Both the Author and the Publisher (p. 119)

  • Do not list the organization as the Author. Leave the Author field blank, and begin the citation with the Title.
  • Only list the organization as the Publisher.

Organization as Publisher (pp. 170-71)

  • If the organization listed in the source has many parts, enter the parts from largest to smallest, and separate them with commas. 

American Library Association, American Association of School Libraries


Government Agency as Publisher (p. 171)

  • If the government agency listed in the source has many parts, shorten the name by only keeping the government name and the primary agency. 

Publisher as listed in source:  U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Bureau of Justice Statistics
Publisher as listed in citation:  U.S. Department of Justice


Omit the Publisher When the Source Is... (p. 165)

  • A periodical (journal, magazine, newspaper)
  • Self-published, which is a work published by its author or editor
  • A website whose title is essentially the same as the name of its publisher
  • A website not involved in producing the works it makes available (for example, a service for users’ content such as WordPress or YouTube; an archive such as JSTOR or ProQuest). These may be cited as a container.
     

Resources

MLA Handbook. 9th ed., Modern Language Association of America, 2021.

The MLA Style Center: Writing Resources from the Modern Language Association. Modern Language Association of America, 2021, style.mla.org.