Creating Narrative Citations

In a narrative citation, the author's name is part of your sentence, and only the year goes in parentheses.

In the example above, author Cliff Christi is mentioned by name in the sentence. Including his name again in a parenthetical citation would be redundant. APA accounts for this by allowing you to omit the author's name from the citation.

Creating a Narrative Citation

1. Place your cursor where you want the citation. 
2. Click + Add Citation under the correct reference. 
3. Choose In your sentence.
   The preview shows the narrative form, such as Daniels and Ochoa (2019).
4. Click Create Citation. 

PERRLA inserts the citation into your paper.

Note: If your sentence already names the author, PERRLA selects In your sentence for you and leaves the name out. PERRLA never changes the words you wrote.

In PERRLA Online, you can also type ( right after the author's name, such as According to Daniels and Ochoa (, to open the citation menu in APA and MLA papers.