Guidelines for Citing
an Oral History
see
MLA Handbook and Turabian

Gibaldi, Joseph. MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers. 5th ed. New York: The Modern Language Association of America, 1999. 172-173.

    For purposes of documentation, there are three kinds of interviews:
    Published or recorded interviews
    Interviews broadcast on television or radio
    Interviews conducted by the researcher

Begin with the name of the person interviewed.  If the interview is part of a publication, recording, or program, enclose the title of the interview, if any, in quotation marks; if the interview was published independently, underline the title.  If the interview is untitled, use the descriptive label Interview, neither underlined nor enclosed in quotation marks.  The interviewer's name may be added if known and pertinent to your paper (see the sample entries for Blackmun and Nader).  Conclude with the appropriate bibliographic information.

Blackmun, Harry.  Interview with Ted Koppel and Nina Totenberg.  Nightline.  ABC. WABC, New York.  5 Apr. 1994.

Fellini, Federico. "The Long Interview." Juliet of the Spirits. Ed. Tullio Kezich. Trans. Howard Greenfield. New York: Ballentine, 1966. 17-64.

Gordimer, Nadine. Interview. New York Times 10 Oct. 1991, late ed.: C25.

Lansbury, Angela. Interview. Off-Camera: Conversations with the Makers of Prime-Time Television. By Richard Levinson and William Link. New York: Plume-NAL, 1986. 72-86.

Nader, Ralph. Interview with Ray Suarez. Talk of the Nation. Natl. Public Radio. WBUR, Boston. 16 Apr. 1998.

Wolfe, Tom. Interview. The Wrong Stuff: American Architecture. Dir. Tom Bettag. Videocassette. Carousel, 1983.

To cite an interview that you conducted, give the name of the person interviewed, the kind of interview (Personal interview, Telephone interview), and the date.

Pei, I. M. Personal interview. 22 July 1993.

Poussaint, Alvin F. Telephone interview. 10 Dec. 1990.

Turabian, Kate L. A Manual for Writers of Term Papers, Theses, and Dissertations. 6th ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996.150.

References to interviews include the name of the person or group interviewed; any interview title in quotation marks; the words interview by followed by the interviewer's name; the medium in which the interview appeared - whether a book, journal, radio or television program, or some other form - in italics or quotation marks as it would be in any reference; the name of any editor, translator, or director; and the facts of publication or other information required for locating printed or nonprinted sources:

1. Raymond Bellour, "Alternation, Segmentation, Hypnosis: Interview with Raymond Bellour," interview by Janet Bergstrom, Camera Obscura, nos. 3-4 (summer 1979): 93.

2. Isaac Bashevis Singer, interview by Harold Flender, in Writers at Work: The "Paris Review" Interviews, ed. George Plimpton, 5th ser. (New York: Viking Press, 1981), 85.

3. Horace Hunt [pseud.], interview by Ronald Schatz, tape recording, 16 May 1976, Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, Harrisburg.

References to interviews conducted by the author of a paper should include the name of the person interviewed; a description of the type of interview capitalized sentence style; and the place and date of the interview:

4. Merle A. Roemer, interview by author, tape recording, Millington, Md., 26 July 1973.

Return to Top         Oral History Collections