New Questions and Answers
from Chicago
Q. I realize that the rules regarding hyphenation are fluid, but I was wondering if you could clarify an issue that has been bothering me. Is there a good way to know when to hyphenate two words serving as an adjective, especially when ambiguity could be an issue? For example, would the phrase “foreign language skills” be hyphenated? What about “large book sale”? Could this second phrase be interpreted as “a sale of large books” instead of “a large sale of books”?
A. If a hyphen can save you from ambiguity, then go for it. That’s what hyphens are for. If a hyphen wouldn’t help (as in “large book sale”), then rephrasing as you have done will fix the problem.
Q. Is there a proofreaders’ mark for the number sign? I’m a copy editor and I frequently come across the issue of having to insert a space between a word and a number sign (e.g., between “Employee” and “#”), or I have to insert a space and a number sign. This, obviously, causes some confusion because it looks like I’m asking to have two spaces inserted.
A. When you insert a symbol like that (or a question mark or exclamation mark), you should write a clarification in the margin. Write “set number sign” and circle it next to or above your #. If there’s room somewhere on the page, write out the whole phrase as you want it to appear and draw a circle around it. Note that Chicago style avoids putting a # sign with a number; it’s quite often superfluous.
Q. Question: When the day of a month is spelled out, as in “the second of January,” should it be capitalized, i.e., “the Second of January”?
Q. Which is correct: “on January second” or “on January Second”?
A. Okay, this is intriguing: these two questions arrived on the same day a few hours apart. Do we have dueling colleagues? Friends who made a bet? Or maybe—tragically—soul mates who don’t even know each other and never will? The answer is that Chicago style lowercases the number of the month unless it’s a holiday like the Fourth of July. Will one of you write to explain this mystery when it’s posted? Let’s hope for an update next month.
Q. I am editing a short story about Rosa Parks. Should “blacks” be used instead of “African Americans”? My Australian colleague seems to think that “blacks” is more socially accepted, but I totally disagree.
A. Since these terms go in and out of fashion and may be regional in their popularity, in this case you should let the author decide.
Q. In a school application would it be correct to say “At UPenn, I will participate in XYZ club” or “At UPenn, I would participate in XYZ club”? For an applicant who doesn’t yet know whether he will be admitted, the latter seems correct. Please advise. Thanks.
A. Yes, you’ve put your finger on this subtle difference. UPenn might be impressed by your self-confidence if you use the “will” construction—or they might just think you’re arrogant. Good luck!
Q. I normally have cited at the beginning of a paraphrase. For instance, if I am using three sentences to express a scholar’s point, I would reference after the first sentence. I recently was advised that this is not correct and that the last sentence of the three is the sentence that needs the reference. Can you enlighten me on which is correct?
A. If your paraphrase is obviously a summary of this scholar’s work, and if you make it clear to readers where the summary begins and ends (and why wouldn’t you?), either location for the note callout will be fine.
Q. When one makes an adjective out of a proper name, does one retain the capital letter? For example, should “gram-negative,” the adjective describing a bacterium showing a certain result on Gram’s test, actually be written “Gram-negative” (as my spellchecker seems to “think”)?
A. Many such terms do take initial upper case. CMOS notes, however, that “personal, national, or geographical names, and words derived from such names, are often lowercased when used with a nonliteral meaning,” as in “dutch oven” or “french fries.” In the case of “gram-negative,” Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th ed.) supports you by lowercasing, although a brief online survey suggests that uppercasing is also accepted by authorities.
Q. I wonder what your ruling is on using Latin-based (but non-Latin) characters as part of a person’s name. At my job, I am often required to write about Turkish Prime Minister Erdoğan. English publications usually write it as “Erdogan,” but this has the side effect of people pronouncing it “Er-do-gan” and looking foolish. I would argue we should write it “Erdoğan,” as this more closely reflects the name’s pronunciation (as well as its actual spelling), and the alphabet is still comprehensible to an English speaker. However, what is your take?
A. If your typesetters can set the correct letter, by all means use it. Although writers who quote you may type a plain g, not knowing how to reproduce the special character, there’s nothing you can do about that. Whenever it’s appropriate, help your readers out by providing the pronunciation in parentheses or in a note.
Q. I wrote a profile article for an in-house employee-networking group’s intranet Web site. My lead consisted of a quote from the interviewee and my reply, which included the pronoun “I” in the sentence. The committee chair decided I should not be the only one credited as writer, since in her thinking, some editing suggestions that I incorporated in the final version negated my “ownership” as sole writer, so she changed the byline to “Reported by [me, Jane Doe 1, Jane Doe 2].” She then changed the “I” in the lead to “we.” How is something like this seen in the publishing world? Would it be considered fabrication, copyright infringement, or just a case of bad judgment?
A. Although I don’t think it’s grounds for a lawsuit, typically writers receive editing without having to share the byline. If Janes 1 and 2 didn’t actually create original text or provide you with source material, then it shouldn’t matter how much they reworked your piece—you are entitled to be the author. If they gave you paragraphs that you integrated into the article, or did research for you, then they could at least be acknowledged as contributors. If the Janes did substantial original work (not editing), they can claim coauthorship. “Reported by” fudges these issues, but it suggests a true collaboration. If you drafted the piece and it was printed more or less intact after editing, even substantive editing, you should have the byline, and acknowledgment of others would be up to you. It’s tough for copyeditors, but we have to accept that we aren’t in it for the glory.
Q. Hello—I need to correctly format an Australian law for a nonlegal publication. May I use the format suggested in CMOS for British historical records? I realize that this is specific to UK publications, but it seems like the best approximation.
A. Yes, you may.
Q. Can I write dialogues without quotation marks as the author Frank McCourt did in his three memoirs?
A. Yes, you can.
January Q&A
Q. Is it acceptable to use a semicolon and and tagged onto the second-to-last item of a bulleted list? Apologies if I missed this on the CMOS site.
A. If your list forms a sentence, yes, semicolons work well, and there’s no rule against using and.
Q. I cannot find a reference to this in my Manual: because versus since. I have been tutored that because is used for instances of cause/effect and that since is for time. However, one of my authors is a scholar who contends that “ since denotes a state of being based on a relationship. . . Because implies causality between one aspect of that relationship and the other.” Can you explain this to me more clearly or refute it altogether?
A. All you need is a dictionary—you and your author seem to be following variations on an old superstition. CMOS covers this in the “Word Usage” section under the word since: “This word may relate either to time {since last winter} or to causation {since I’m a golfer, I know what ‘double bogey’ means}. Some writers erroneously believe that the word relates exclusively to time. But the causal since was a part of the English language before Chaucer wrote in the fourteenth century, and it is useful as a slightly milder way of expressing causation than because. But if there is any possibility of confusion with the temporal sense, use because.”
Q. I am continually encountering extremely long lists ending with “as well as X” in this construction: “I talked about A, B, C, D, E, and F as well as X.” In 95 percent of these cases, X is not comparative, contrastive, or emphatic but merely a last-minute tack-on to the list. (Otherwise, I would probably use a dash or comma.) Given these circumstances, should a comma always precede “as well as”? I work at a highly political nonprofit where I am not always allowed to rephrase even minor things (big egos). Sometimes correct revisions are vetoed, and incorrect punctuation, improper word usage or citation formatting, grammatical mistakes, and misspellings are published rather than risk offending the original author.
A. A comma is optional in that position. The construction “E, F, as well as X,” however, should be changed, either by inserting “and” before F or by changing “as well as” to “and.” (I hope your readers don’t base their donations on the quality of your publications.)
Q. Is it necessary to use a comma after words like next, then, after that, last, and finally when they are the beginning of a sentence? I am a lower-school teacher and need to clarify this.
A. Punctuation is not so simple that you can make a rule that a comma “always” follows a given word or phrase. Commas depend on syntax as well as pacing, tone, and personal preference. Two examples with next:
Next comes the scene where he buries the toenails.
Next, since he was still breathing, she worked a crossword puzzle.
Please don’t teach your students punctuation until you understand this. Find a grammar book and read the punctuation chapter. CMOS is a good place to start.
Q. I’m copyediting a book that’s using endnotes with no bibliography. For multiple authors, should I use the rule in CMOS and list up to ten authors in the first endnote? What if each chapter in the book I'm copyediting is written by a different author, and these authors differ in the number of authors they list in the endnotes? Does the copyeditor then have a role in imposing consistency?
A. In note citations of works with four or more authors, Chicago recommends naming only one author and adding et al. to stand for the rest, but that’s assuming there’s a bibliography. If there isn’t one, it’s up to the writer how many names to include. In a multiauthor work, the copyeditor should decide (or ask) at the start whether chapters need to be consistent only within themselves or across the entire book.
Q. Should I capitalize “the states” when used alone (referring to the United States)? I’m copyediting a novel in which the author capitalizes “the States” when used alone. I think it would be lowercased.
A. Actually, “the States” is capped when it means the United States. It’s only when referring to individual states collectively that you should lowercase: “Each of the states elects two senators,” as opposed to “I’m going back to the States.”
Q. I am a grad student and I have been asked to turn my project into an article that can (hypothetically) be published in a journal. The particular journal uses The Chicago Manual of Style; are there particular guidelines for articles instead of books?
A. Yes. Take a look at our Quick Guide to get the idea: http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citationguide.html .
Q. Hi, there! In a bibliography or reference list, Chicago recommends inverting only the first author’s name and not subsequent author names. What’s the reason for this? Why not invert all author names? I trust in Chicago’s expertise, but I would like to know why, because I often have to defend my copyediting decisions.
A. Because it’s so darned hard to read names backward. You might rather ask the opposite question: why on earth would anyone reverse the names? The first author’s name is reversed to facilitate alphabetizing, but there’s no reason to tangle up the rest.
Q. Perhaps the most important quote for the paper I am writing comes from the footnote of something someone wrote in a scholarly journal. Is there a particular way I should have to endnote this since the quote comes from a footnote?
A. Yes. In addition to the page number, give the note number: 256n4.
Q. If a number of references are given in the same endnote, should they be given in any particular order (e.g., alphabetically)?
A. References are usually given in the order that they apply to the text or in order of importance. If neither is relevant, then alphabetical (or chronological) order is fine.
Q. In a sentence, a colon should always be preceded by an independent clause. Why doesn’t the Chicago Manual state this explicitly? All your examples follow the principle. Why doesn’t the manual just say that the introductory clause has to be independent?
A. Because we’re a bunch of spineless and ineffectual prevaricators? Or because there are times when a colon need not be preceded by an independent clause? A case in point: this one.
