Chicago Manual of Style

What work tools do you keep close to you?

January 8, 2013 By Administrator

Chuck Green, the brilliant graphic artist and more, recently discussed (in a newsletter) the work tools he keeps close to him. They are:

a card with fraction to decimal conversion chart
a list of words I chronically misspell
a Field Notes Calendar
a Moleskine notebook
a stack of lined 3×5 cards
a pad of Bienfang Parchment Tracing Paper
a Rolodex that I look at once every couple of months …and so on.

This got me thinking about what my work tools are. Whether online or physically, I have a dictionary and thesaurus, followed by Chicago Manual of Style, The Gregg Reference Manual, and the AP Stylebook. I also keep a red pen close by. And when I’m at my desk, I have an OTT-LITE to brighten my hard copy. Finally, I have a small cat that insists on curling up on my lap and snoozing while I’m working. Which is fine unless I’ve a project with many papers on my desk and the need to move frequently.

What about you?

P.S. Do consider signing up for Chuck Green’s newsletter. He is so generous with his ideas on design and presentation.

Capitalizing north, east, south, and west

February 9, 2012 By Administrator

By Judy Vorfeld

Have you ever wondered when it’s okay to capitalize north, east, south, and west?

Most style guides say that compass points and the terms derived from them are lowercased if they just mean direction or location.

But you capitalize them when they’re specific regions or an integral part of a proper name.

For example, you’d say:

Out West
Back East
The western part of the state
Drive north three miles, then turn east (direction)
A northern winter
the West Coast (region)
west coast (shoreline)
west side of town (direction)

When all is said and done, variations are based on context and usage. Use these only as guidelines, not something cast in concrete!

Information from the Chicago Manual of Style and The Gregg Reference Manual.

How To Abbreviate Days of the Week and Months

February 24, 2010 By Administrator

In a quandary about how to abbreviate days of the week and months? Welcome to the twenty-first century! Let’s take three excellent style guides and see what they offer.

THE GREGG REFERENCE MANUAL, NINTH EDITION says, “Do not abbreviate days of the week and months of the year except in tables or lists where space is limited.”

Gregg is addressing business documents, for the most part. It suggests that abbreviations are appropriate when the emphasis is on “communicating data in the briefest form. In other kinds of writing, where a more formal style is appropriate, use abbreviations sparingly. When in doubt, spell it out.”

The latest AP STYLEBOOK says, “When a month is used with a specific date, abbreviate only Jan., Feb., Aug., Sept., Oct., Nov. and Dec. Spell out when using alone, or with a year alone.”

It says that in tabular material, use three-letter forms without a period (the first three letters of each month).

The stylebook, published primarily for journalists, also says to capitalize the days of the week, and to not abbreviate them except when needed to facilitate tabular composition.

THE CHICAGO MANUAL OF STYLE, 15th Edition, targets authors, editors, proofreaders, indexers, copywriters, designers, and publishers. “Where space restrictions require that the names of months be abbreviated,” it says, “one of the following systems may be used. The second and third, which take no periods, are used respectively in computer systems and indexes of periodical literature.” It follows with these examples:

Jan. (or Jan or Ja)
Feb. (or Feb or F)
Mar. (or Mar or Mr)
Apr. (or Apr or Ap)
May (or May or My)
June (or Jun or Je)
July (or Jul or Jl)
Aug. (or Aug or Ag)
Sept. (or Sep or S)
Oct. (or Oct or O)
Nov. (or Nov or N)
Dec. (or Dec or D)

CMS says much the same about days of the week. Use where space restrictions exist as follows:

Sun. or Su
Mon. or M
Tues. or Tu
Wed. or W
Thurs. or Th
Fri. or F
Sat. or Sa