New Questions and Answers
from Chicago
at http://www.subversivecopye
ditor.com/blog/.
Q. Which of the following is correct? “Canadian customers, call 1-800-etc.,” or “Canada customers, call 1-800-etc.”? I’m inclined toward the former, but keep thinking about that darn Canada goose.
A. For your purposes, Canadian citizenship mustn’t be confused with one’s location in Canada. Given that a Canadian might want to call from New Jersey, for instance, it would be clearer to write, “From Canada, call 1-800-etc.”
Q. We’re hosting a golf tournament where each hole has a refreshment station sponsored by a corporate vendor. For each of the hole signs, we wrote “Refreshments Sponsor” and then put the corporate logo on it. My coworker says each sign should read “Refreshment Sponsor” with the argument that you wouldn’t say “Beverages Sponsor.” What say you?
A. Sometimes an attributive becomes conventional in the singular (toy store), and sometimes in the plural (ladies room). Often we choose by ear and it doesn’t matter (employee lounge, employees lounge). But “refreshments” connotes something slightly different from “refreshment,” and if you check a dictionary, you’ll find that the plural is best suited for your signs.
Q. “Between” vs. “among.” I’m going insane. I think the editor who changed my wording is just clueless or hasn’t given the issue enough thought. Please help. I’ve read the advice in CMOS, Garner’s Modern American Usage, Bernstein’s The Careful Writer, The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language, and a few other sources, but I can’t decide. Should I say “competition between companies” or “competition among companies”? They’re competing with each other, severally and individually. At least, that’s what I think. Or is “among” justified on the grounds that competition implies vague, intricate relationships? Do I need an economist to clear this usage question up? Are there right and wrong answers in this case? The phrase is “competition between/among companies is intensifying.”
A. It really doesn’t matter. The editor might well be clueless—it happens—but you are overthinking this.
Q. I am writing a research paper about a school. How do I cite written histories by individuals that are not published or dated? Thank you.
A. Give the information that you have and indicate where information is not available. Model your citation on the usual form: author, title, kind of document (manuscript, letter, etc.), place, date, and where you found it. “N.p.” can stand in for “no place,” “no publisher,” and “no page number”; “n.d.” for “no date.” For example, Deborah Dorman, “Psychoanalyzing the Penguin,” manuscript, Misc. Papers File, Chicago College Library, n.d.
Q. Hi there! For a sign for bachelorette parties, would the phrase “Bachelorette Out of Control” be more appropriate than “Bachelorette’s Out of Control”? The question is one of contraction, because I don’t see how “Bachelorette’s Out of Control” can be correct without “The” prefacing it. Thank you!
A. Out-of-control bachelorettes who require appropriate signage aren’t very convincing, but the first version is better.
Q. I am editing a piece that makes several references to unspoken orders. For example: He climbed up the plank and handed the engineer a “go” order. Or, After ten minutes he signaled “stop.” Should these orders be in quotations?
A. Yes. Quotation marks needn’t imply that something was spoken. Your sentences are much easier to read with quotation marks signaling the special uses of “go” and “stop.”
Q. I am writing a report for a U.S. government agency. My contacts want me to capitalize “federal,” as in “Federally funded.” This looks incorrect to me. I couldn’t find a specific rule in the Manual, though the examples I saw seem to support my opinion. I would appreciate your guidance. Thanks!
A. Chicago does not cap “federal,” since it’s not a proper noun, but it’s common for a company to toot its own horn by capping company-related terms (like “the University”), and the government is no different. If the agency’s house style is to cap it, then that’s all you need to know.
Q. I checked throughout CMOS and find not a single mention of the interrobang. How could there not even be a single mention of such an intriguing punctuation option?!
A. And we don’t mention smiley faces, either! Some of us are keeping a list for the next edition.☺
Q. CMOS suggests that non-English terms be italicized on first use, a practice I follow when editing nonfiction. I am currently editing a novel set in Caesar’s time, featuring Roman weapons and other Latin terms. Does this practice also apply to novels? I find the italics interrupt the flow in fiction.
A. Many rules that work well in nonfiction are better forgotten in novels. Readers of fiction are used to encountering words that at first sight may be nonsensical. Your job is to make sure that readers don’t have to wait too long for the context to make the meaning clear.
Q. A question recently came up in an English class: how many semicolons can you use in one sentence? We discussed how many you should use, but we were still curious whether or not there is an official limit to how many you can use and still be grammatically correct. What’s your answer?
A. You can use an infinite number of semicolons and still be grammatically correct. (Another reminder that good grammar does not equal good writing.)
Q. Dear Chicago, what verb tense do you recommend for the literature review section of a scholarly article? APA insists on the past tense, arguing that any work included in a literature review was obviously published in the past. People writing about English literature, on the other hand, discuss works in the present tense because readers always experience the book in the present. I’m editing a Canadian public policy journal, and the author uses the present tense to discuss works published ten or fifteen years ago. Should I change these tenses to the present perfect? The journal has no in-house rule on this.
A. Since the use of the present tense in literature reviews is widely accepted, and since any decision about where to cut off “past” from “present” literature would have to be arbitrary, using the present tense for everything is a fine option. You shouldn’t worry about using it if a journal doesn’t express a preference.
Q. Can I use the first person?
A. Evidently.
June Q&A
Q. I’m wondering about the ampersand versus and in journal titles. There are two examples where Chicago uses and for a journal whose title online has an ampersand (Past and Present; Trends in Ecology and Evolution). Is it fair to extrapolate from these examples that Chicago would recommend replacing the ampersand in citations of journals?
A. It is. Since there is no easy way to check whether an author’s choices are random or scrupulous, conventionally editors have chosen one style or the other to impose throughout. Chicago prefers and. Even now that it’s possible to check online, we think it’s more expedient to choose one style and be consistent, given the amount of research it would entail to check the style of and in every title, not to mention the complication that a publication may itself use one style on its jacket or in a logo and another in running text.
Q. Hello, Chicago. You state that “an opening parenthesis should be preceded by a comma or a semicolon only in an enumeration” as in (1) a brown fox, (2) a silver fox. There are no other exceptions. You also say that the same rules apply to brackets. Another editor wants this: New Westminster, BC: Pie Tree Press, [1988]. It looks very wrong to me! I say the comma goes, because the bracketed matter is an interpolation, not part of the original text, and the comma has no function. Therefore the punctuation should be as if that interpolation doesn’t exist.
A. Although you could omit the comma or put it inside the brackets, it reads most smoothly the way you’ve shown it. A citation isn’t a quotation. The comma is being supplied by the author who’s writing the citation. In fact, citations in CMOS’s documentation chapters show a comma before a bracketed date in just this way, so yes, this is another exception to the general rule.
Q. We have a difference of opinion in my company about the capitalization of defined terms in policy and procedure documents. One group would like to capitalize all defined terms, for example, “All Statements must be mailed on the 3rd of the month.” This is similar to legal documents and would separate the Statement as a specific item from a nondefined version of a statement. The other group feels this is distracting and does not add to comprehension. What does the Oracle of Style say?
A. Form a committee! Chicago, you may know, is famously partial to lowercasing, but there’s no right answer, so just hammer this out among you, put it in your house style guide, and move on.
Q. In expressing the statistical change in GDP figures over the course of multiple decades, would it be most correct to write “2000% increase,” “2,000% increase,” or “2,000 percent increase”? Our copyeditor favors the second option, but the use of the comma in that context just doesn’t sit right with me. Please advise.
A. All those styles are acceptable. In text, Chicago style spells out “percent” and favors a comma in numbers over 999, but if your numbers appear in a table, “2000%” might look better.
Q. I often have difficulty deciding how to cite translations with critical commentaries of ancient texts. What if I’m citing a critical comment or note made by the translator/Loeb editor? The bibliography entry is
Aristotle. Nicomachean Ethics. Rev. ed. Loeb Classical Library. 1934.
But how do I refer to something the editor/translator says in that edition? If it’s like “Rackham in Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics , p. xxx,” then do I need some separate bib entry that mentions Rackham?
A. Yes, that’s right. Your bibliography entry should include the name of the editor, like this:
Aristotle. Nicomachean Ethics. Rev. ed. Edited by H. Rackham. Loeb Classical Library. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1934.
If the editor is more central to your discussion than the author, you may put the bibliography entry under the name of the editor instead. A cross-reference will aid the reader.
Aristotle. See Rackham, H.
Rackham, H., ed. Nicomachean Ethics, by Aristotle. Rev. ed. Loeb Classical Library. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1934.
Q. I’ve been having a debate with a vendor regarding commas. What is the proper way to punctuate a compound sentence with an introductory clause that applies to both parts of the sentence? For example, “During percussion, tympany is a hollow sound over an air-filled structure and dullness is a thud-type sound over a solid structure.” Most style guides cover the need for a comma after an introductory phrase (unless it is very short and clear) and the need for a comma between the independent clauses of a compound sentence (unless they are very short and related), but they don’t provide specific guidance for both elements in one sentence. I have interpreted this omission to mean that the comma should generally be used in both places, after the introductory phrase and between the independent clauses, but my vendor is insisting that the comma isn’t needed between the independent clauses because the introductory phrase applies to both of them.
A. The introductory phrase is not the most important consideration, grammatically. In the sentence you provide, the comma before and is optional because the clauses are short; the lack of a comma also helps to show that the introductory phrase applies to both clauses. If your clauses were longer or more complex, however, they would need a comma to separate them even if they were both governed by the same introductory phrase.
Q. When sending a paper manuscript for approval of publication in a journal, should it be softbound or sent as loose papers?
A. Always loose! An editor doesn’t want to wrestle with a binding in order to isolate selected pages to photocopy, scan, stick in a briefcase, hand to a colleague, or use for scrap paper. (Ahem—forget that last one.) And don’t forget to check with your publisher for guidelines. Many prefer electronic submissions.
Q. What do ellipses within brackets mean? Often I find this [ . . . ] within a quote. Does this mean that there is an ellipsis in the quoted passage in the original?
A. Actually, no—it means that material has been omitted from the original by the author who is quoting it. The use of brackets to distinguish ellipses from suspension points is especially common in European publications.
Q. I understand that the term Other is a philosophical term. I am editing an article where the author uses it capitalized throughout. It looks awkward. Here’s an example: “The trope of the Other is typically associated with the arousal of negative feelings of fear and disgust.” My question is this: could it be initially capitalized or in quotes, and then subsequently written lowercase? What does CMS recommend?
A. In philosophical works, it’s better not to meddle unless the capping is obviously the result of inattention or a global replacement in a phrase like “On the Other hand.” It’s always fine to query individual cases. If you choose to edit some of them, do it transparently (either marked on paper or tracked electronically), so the author can review them and make adjustments.
Q. What is the correct punctuation for an event or location for a group? I have the following examples: delegates’ reception, members’ forum, speakers’ room. Is it correct to always use the apostrophe in this way? Thanks.
A. Always? It’s always correct to form the plural possessive with an apostrophe in that way, but it is not always necessary to use the plural possessive in writing about an event or location for a group. An attributive will often do just as well (VIP lounge), in which case you don’t need the apostrophe.
Q. How do you cite T-shirts?
A. You could write, for example: Last week on Ellis Avenue I saw a T-shirt that said, “I keep pressing Escape but I’m still here.” That is, if you think it’s a good idea to cite a T-shirt.
