Think of it like finding a $20 bill on the sidewalk. You don’t know who dropped it, but you still know it’s money. In MLA style, you handle a missing author the same way: you use the title instead.
Imagine you’re quoting a baking blog for your cookie recipe essay. The article is called “The Secret to Chewy Cookies,” but the author is just “Admin.” You don’t need a name hunt. You just use a shortened version of the title in your citation.
How to Do It Without Sweating
Here’s the simple formula: put the title (or a shortened version) in quotation marks. Then add the page number if you have one. For example: (“Chewy Cookies” 12). That’s it. No chasing ghosts.
Let’s say you’re quoting a whole website article, like a news piece from “The Onion.” The headline is “Study Shows 90% of People Love Being Wrong.” Since there’s no byline, your in-text citation becomes (“Study Shows”). Your reader sees that and knows exactly where to look in your Works Cited.
What about a book with no author? It happens more than you’d think, especially with old recipes or government reports. You treat it the same way: if the book’s title is Italian Cooking for Beginners, your citation is (Italian Cooking 45). Shorten it smartly, like you’re giving a friendly nickname.
