When should I include the name of a broadcaster in my works-cited-list entry?

Note: This post relates to content in the eighth edition of the MLA Handbook. For up-to-date guidance, see the ninth edition of the MLA Handbook.

Include the name of a broadcaster in the “Publisher” slot of a works-cited-list entry when it is the organization primarily responsible for producing the work:

In the example below, of an entry for a radio broadcast, the broadcaster—National Public Radio—is listed as the publisher:

Fresh Air. Narrated by Terry Gross, National Public Radio, 20 May 2008.

In the following example of a podcast streamed on the WNYC website, the broadcaster WNYC Studios is listed as copublisher of the work:

“Yiyun Li Reads ‘On the Street Where You Live.’” The Writer’s Voice: New Fiction from The New Yorker, The New Yorker and WNYC Studios, 3 Jan. 2017. WNYC, www.wnyc.org/shows/tnyauthorsvoice/3.