Q. I am writing a seminar paper of which the majority of references are interviews I have done. How do I reference these within the paper? Should I provide a note each time I reference an interview? What should the note look like if I’m also attaching a full bibliography?
A. Please see CMOS 14.211: “Unpublished interviews are best cited in text or in notes, though they occasionally appear in bibliographies. Citations should include the names of both the person interviewed and the interviewer; brief identifying information, if appropriate; the place or date of the interview (or both, if known); and, if a transcript or recording is available, where it may be found.” If you give complete information in the text, you don’t also need a note. Write something like “In an interview with the author in Hinsdale, Illinois, on February 20, 2008, Richard Goss claimed that . . .” The next time, you can be more brief: “In my 2008 interview with Goss, I learned . . .” For examples of note form, see 14.211.
[This answer relies on the 17th edition of CMOS (2017) unless otherwise noted.]
Q. I’ve been asked to change the author-date style used in a list of works cited to the author-title humanities
style. But some of the authors have multiple works, some with the same year of publication. In the author-date style, it was
written 1949a, 1949b, and so on, and cited in the text as (author 1949b). When I move the date to follow the publisher’s
name, how do I handle that? Can I write “City: Publisher, 1949(b)”? Some of those
entries refer to journals, which would mean “Journal Name 2 (1949b): 3–7.” Which looks silly. Please help me out of this awkward spot!
A. The request to put the list of works cited in humanities style while leaving the text citations as author-date is unreasoned
and unworkable, as you’ve figured out for yourself. The styles should be the same. If you must change
the list of works cited, then you must also change the text citations. I’m sorry not to be more helpful—unless
perhaps this advice from Chicago will help you make a case for leaving things as they are.
[This answer relies on the 17th edition of CMOS (2017) unless otherwise noted.]
Q. What is the correct way to cite websites in an appendix or bibliography? Do you include the name of the organization, and then the website?
A. Yes, that’s right. Several sections in chapter 14 of CMOS cover ways to cite electronic sources; see especially 14.207. If you do not have a subscription to CMOS Online, you can find some examples at our Citation Quick Guide.
[This answer relies on the 17th edition of CMOS (2017) unless otherwise noted.]
Q. When using a pseudonym to hide the real name of an organization, how do you cite that organization’s
website in the references?
A. Hmm—fake URL? Encryption? Disappearing ink? (Is this a trick question?)
[This answer relies on the 17th edition of CMOS (2017) unless otherwise noted.]
Q. When I reference an author within the body of my text, do I then repeat the author’s name in the footnote?
A. If it’s an actual footnote (at the bottom of the page), it’s not necessary to
repeat the author’s name, but if the notes are gathered at the end of the chapter or the back of the
book, it’s helpful to the reader to do so.
[This answer relies on the 17th edition of CMOS (2017) unless otherwise noted.]
Q. I’m preparing a bibliography for an edited volume, which means merging the bibliographies from ten chapters. One of the authors seems to be a German speaker, and though his writing is in English, the titles in his bibliography are in German. Must I translate these? Is there a difference if he read them in German or English? And if I do not need to translate the titles of the works, should I still translate words like “editor” and “volume?”
A. The books that are cited should be the ones the author consulted, no matter what language they are in. For guidelines and examples of full citations of books published in languages other than English (including how to deal with terms like “editor”), please see chapter 14 in CMOS (start with paragraphs 14.99 and 14.102). Unless you are fluent in German and have been hired for the purpose of translating, it’s a terrible idea to translate the titles.
[This answer relies on the 17th edition of CMOS (2017) unless otherwise noted.]
Q. Sometimes a work will cite a series of annual publications: The Annual Report on Stuff for 1993–1997, 1999, and 2001–2004, say. Does the bibliography or reference list
need a separate entry for each year’s volume, or is there an appropriate way to combine them into one
entry? If they can be combined, how can breaks in the sequence be handled? Sometimes I feel silly putting eleven basically
identical entries in a reference list, but if eleven volumes of the report were consulted . . . ?
A. Use one entry and note the range of years. There’s no need to indicate in the bibliography which years
you consulted—you’ll do that in the notes. If the annual was not published in
every year in the range, you can add the word “intermittently” after the range.
[This answer relies on the 17th edition of CMOS (2017) unless otherwise noted.]
Q. We are using the author-date form of citation. One author cited appears in the reference list with four items for a single year (Author 2003a, 2003b, 2003c, 2003d). However, in the last entry, the person is the editor, rather than the author, of the work. Thus, the entry is Author, J. Q., ed. 2003d. But this entry currently occurs after entries dated to 2004, 2005, and 2006. This makes the entry difficult to find, though the author clearly is attempting to follow the rule that “edited entries follow those of which the person cited is the author.” What would CMOS do?
A. Chicago no longer recommends putting edited works after authored ones (see CMOS 15.19), so this solves your problem. In any case, it’s not a good idea to force a rule for the sake of a rule. Rather, help the reader out by bending or breaking the rule.
[This answer relies on the 17th edition of CMOS (2017) unless otherwise noted.]
Q. I have an author listed in the bibliography. Below that entry will be one with the same author plus a second author. Should
I use a 3-em dash to represent the repeated name, or should I spell it out?
A. Spell it out. Use the 3-em dash when the author information is entirely the same.
[This answer relies on the 17th edition of CMOS (2017) unless otherwise noted.]
Q. Should I use footnotes to simply list the reference information or are they for adding additional information mainly?
A. Footnotes serve both purposes. Usually, notes that consist mainly of citations are collected at the back of the book (endnotes),
while notes that are more discursive might go at the bottom of the page (footnotes). Many books mix the two purposes, but
in every case the author and editor must decide whether readers (that is, buyers) would be put off by footnotes or prefer
them.
[This answer relies on the 17th edition of CMOS (2017) unless otherwise noted.]