Wasafiri Style Sheet 2016
General Style Points
- Use, ‘eighteenth century’ — NOT ‘18th century’; hyphenate eighteenth-century only when it is being used as an adjective ie ‘eighteenth-century writing’.
- Note number should go at the end of the sentence after the full stop, not immediately next to the text being cited in the footnote.
- Spell out all numbers under 100.
- Always use ‘it is’, NOT ‘it’s’.
- Always use ‘there is’, NOT ‘there’s’.
- Square brackets should only be used when it is an editorial intervention, authorial intervention should be in normal brackets ( ).
- There should not be a space before or after a slash used to indicate a line break when quoting poetry, // to indicate verse break.
- En-dash for sub-clauses not hyphens; use the longer Em-dash — when clause ends in a full stop eg:
This was the first – if not the only – example.
This was the second example — following the first.
- Use British English spelling eg realise, not realize; labour, not labor; colour, not color; catalogue, not catalog; programme, not program (unless referring to a computer program).
- No full stop after initials or abbreviations in main text, ie, J A Smith.
- ‘North’, ‘South’ etc are capitalised if they are part of the title of an area or a political division eg South West Africa, Western Australia, the West, but not if they are descriptions in general terms eg southern Scotland, the south of Scotland.
- Do not use bold or underline for emphasis, always use italics.
- For interviews, the full name of the interviewer and interviewee should be used the first time they appear in the text (in bold). Thereafter, initials only should be used (also in bold — this is the only instance that the magazine uses bold), with no full stops or spaces between initial letters eg:
RA As I said earlier … (note: two spaces after initials, before text)
- Abbreviations should be consistent and easily identifiable throughout.
- Do not insert an apostrophe in plurals such as MAs, 1970s.
- Omit the full point after contractions containing the last letter of a word (Dr vols Mrs Mr), and after units of measurement (cm, mm). But add full point when the last letter of contraction is not the last letter of word (vol. Sept. Oct.).
- There should be no full points in fully capitalised abbreviations (USA, NATO, UNESCO).
- ie eg etc, et al NOT i.e., e.g,, et al. and etc.
Use of italics
Italicise the following:
- Titles of published books, except the Bible (and books of the Bible) and the Quran (Koran).
- Names of plays, screenplays, radio and television plays, operas, ballets and films.
- Titles of newspapers: New York Times, The Times, The Guardian, Le Monde, Die Welt.
- Titles of magazines, journals, periodicals, whether English-language or not: Journal of Literary Translation, World Literature, Cahiers du Cinéma, Mundo Nuevo.
- Titles of art exhibitions and series of art works eg the photographic projects of Darren Siwes appear in italics as Just Is (2004) and Mum, I want to be Brown (2006).
- Words and short phrases in languages other than English (unless naturalised).
- Titles of chapters, essays, poems and short stories — these should be in single quotation marks instead.
- Titles of paintings, sculpture and other works of art such as individual installations eg the Darren Siwes 2006 photograph (from his Just Is project) appears as ‘My Imaginary Friends’.
- Quotations of less than thirty words are placed in the body of the text ‘in single quotation marks’.
- Quotations of more than thirty words should begin on a new line (first line not indented) and be identified by an extra line of space before and after. Indent the whole quote by 0.5 cm on both left and right, set in 11pt and 1.5 line spacing. This is so that the typesetters can identify where a quote occurs. Quotation marks should not be used for quotations set out in this way.
- Use single quotation marks throughout unless there is a quote within a quote eg ‘Grammar should be “particular” in all cases.’
- Do not change the spelling or punctuation in a quotation.
- The full stop should only be inside the quotation mark if the material quoted is a complete sentence. All other punctuation should fall outside quotation marks.
- Ellipsis should be avoided at the beginning and end of a quotation.
- In English-language book and article titles, capitalise all words except articles and prepositions. Capitalise all first and last words of titles (regardless of their type) eg Noises Off, The Saints Go Marching In. The first word of the subtitle should always be capitalised.
- For book titles and titles of journal articles in languages other than English, please adopt the following conventions:
French: upper case to first noun, then lower case
German: lower case after first word, except all nouns
Italian: lower case after first word, except proper names
Portuguese: lower case after first word, except proper names
Spanish: lower case after first word, except proper names
- AD and BC should be in caps eg 30BC−AD19. Note: no full points in between.
Dates and numbers
- 6 February 1957 (no commas, no th or nd or rd after numeral).
- 1990s (no apostrophe, not ’90s or 90’s).
- fifth century; nineteenth century (numerals), hyphenated if used adjectivally.
- In spans: 1985–1986, 1939–1945, 1914–1918, use en-dash not hyphen.
- In page references etc where using numerals: 9–10, 21–22, 101–02.
- Spell out numbers one to ninety-nine in continuous prose except when referring to large amounts of money with currency sign ($8 million), in mathematical work or measurements. Do not start sentences with numerals.
- Include a space between numbers and units in measurements eg 3 cm, not 3cm.
- Use a full point on the line for decimal points.
- In numbers with three or more digits, comma off the digits in threes: 100 1,000, 10,000, 100,000,000
- Spell out fractions using a hyphen: one-third; four-fifths.
- Use a single space after a full stop and after other punctuation marks such as commas and colons. Do not put a space in front of a question mark or in front of a closing quotation mark. Do not add a space between full stop and endnote reference number.
- Possessive ’s should be used except on classical names ending with s (Achilles’).
- Ellipsis … Treat this like a word, placing a space on either side of the three dots.
Spelling – Use British English eg
black and Black British
Translation and transliteration conventions
- If you cite foreign-language titles, please give, in parentheses, the date of publication and the actual title of its translation, if there is a published one. If no published translation exists, please give a literal translation, without italics, in square brackets. Examples:
Title with published translation: … Fin de partie (1957, Endgame)
Title with no published translation: … Nye Fortaellinger [1893, New Tales]
- If you give quotations in other languages, please provide an English translation immediately following in parentheses.
Endnote numerals in text in Superscript.
We request you to keep notes to a minimum and only use if absolutely essential. All references to books or journals cited will appear in the text and Works Cited section according to standard MLA guidelines (see below). Reviews should avoid notes.
HOW TO ARRANGE THE WORKS CITED — MLA STYLE
The magazine uses a slightly modified version of the format advocated by Joseph Gibaldi and Walter Achtert, MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers. The Modern Languages Association of America, 1999 (www.mla.org). References conform to the MLA style with the following exceptions:
- Use single quotes (not double) throughout.
- The quotation mark should always be inside punctuation. (Except when the quotation is a complete sentence, when the full stop is within the closing quotation mark.)
- No full points to be used in author initials.
- Reference citation in the text should be as follows. The citation should be as brief as possible while directing the reader to the correct reference. We do not encourage large numbers of unnecessary references in articles submitted.
Simply use Name followed by any relevant page number: (Marcuse 197)
In text: Tannen has argued this point (178–85)
More than one author with same name
Add the first initial (or full first name if initial is the same): (A Patterson 183; L Patterson 230)
Two or three authors
Give all author names: (Rabking, Greenberg and Olander vii)
More than three authors
Follow the bibliographic entry: (Lauter et al 24–25) or all last names if given
- Parenthetical referencing should be keyed to the surname of the author in the Reference section. Surname and page number are sufficient eg:
It has been seen as ‘the most profound novel of its age’ (Holden 33).
- If the name of the author is evident, the page number will suffice:
Holden has called it ‘the most profound novel of its age’ (33).
- If the source is unpaginated, ‘no page’ should be indicated:
It has been seen as ‘the most profound novel of its age’ (Holden np).
- If an author has two or more texts represented in the References, a distinguishing abbreviation should be used:
Holden’s opinion changed between 1928 and 1944; what she had seen as ‘the most profound novel of its age’ (Fiction 33) was later characterised as ‘deeply flawed’ (Revisited 21).
This opinion changed between 1928 and 1944; what had been seen as ‘the most profound novel of its age’ (Holden, Fiction 33) was later characterised as ‘deeply flawed’ (Holden, Revisited 21).
- The parenthetical reference follows the punctuation at the end of indented quotations:
In Burke’s criticism we have continual discussion of texts as living objects for both writer and reader, both of whom employ ‘strategies’ to deal with situations. He can also be an excellent close critic. Burke is indispensable because of his recognition that literature actually comes from the texture of life and works within it, like a yeast. (Seymour-Smith 62)
Works Cited Section — Example References
Please do not cite bibliographical information from memory; verify each entry carefully in your bibliography against the original source. We must rely on our contributors to be accurate in their citations.
A Book by a Single Author
Kipling, Rudyard. Kim. 1901. New York: Penguin Classics, 1987.
An Anthology or a Compilation
Lopate, Phillip, ed. The Art of the Personal Essay: An Anthology from the Classical Era to the Present. New York: Anchor-Doubleday, 1994.
Spafford, Peter, comp. and ed. Interference: The Story of Czechoslovakia in the Words of Its Writers. Cheltenham: New Clarion, 1992.
Two or More Books by the Same Author
- Use three hyphens followed by period and then title, or comma and ed. … if appropriate
- Works listed under the same name are alphabetised by title
Borroff, Marie. Language and the Past: Verbal Artistry in Frost, Stevens, and Moore. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1979.
—, trans. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. New York: Norton, 1967.
—, ed. Wallace Stevens: A Collection of Critical Essays. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice, 1963.
A Book by Two or More Authors
Eggins, Suzanne and Diana Slade. Analysing Casual Conversation. London: Cassell, 1997.
- If there are more than three authors, you may name only the first and add et al (‘and others’) or you may give all names in full in the order in which they appear on the title page.
Gilman, Sander et al. Hysteria beyond Freud. Berkeley: U of California P, 1993.
Gilman, Sander, Helen King, Roy Porter, George Rousseau and Elaine Showalter. Hysteria beyond Freud. Berkeley: U of California P, 1993.
- Repeat names in full if the same person is part of a different authorship. Do not use three hyphens unless the total authorship is the same
A Book by a Corporate Author
American Medical Association. The American Medical Association Encyclopedia of Medicine. Ed. Charles B Layman. New York: Random, 1989.
A Work in an Anthology
Allende, Isabel. ‘Toad’s Mouth’. Trans. Margaret Sayers Peden. A Hammock beneath the Mangoes: Stories from Latin America. Ed. Thomas Colchie. New York: Plume, 1992. 83–88.
- Often the works in anthologies have been published before. If you wish to inform your reader of the date when a previously published piece other than a scholarly article first appeared, you may follow the title of the piece with the year of original publication and a period.
Franklin, Benjamin. ‘Emigration to America’. 1782. The Faber Book of America. Ed. Christopher Ricks and William L Vance. Boston: Faber, 1992. 24–26.
An Article in a Reference Book
‘Noon’. The Oxford English Dictionary. 2nd ed. 1989.
Mohanty, Jitendra M. ‘Indian Philosophy’. The New Encyclopedia Britannica: Macropaedia. 15th ed. 1987.
An Introduction, a Preface, a Foreword or an Afterword
Borges, Jorge Luis. Foreword. Selected Poems, 1923–1967. By Borges. Ed. Norman Thomas Di Giovanni. New York: Delta-Dell, 1973. xv–xvi.
- If the introduction, preface, foreword or afterword has a title, give the title, enclosed in quotation marks, immediately before the name of the part.
Brodsky, Joseph. ‘Poetry as a Form of Resistance to Reality’. Foreword. Winter Dialogue. By Tomas Venclova. Trans. Diana Senechal. Evanston: Hydra-Northwestern UP, 1997. vii–xviii.
Breton, André. ‘Un Grand Poete Noir’ [‘A Great Black Poet’]. Preface. 1943. Notebook of a Return to My Native Land. By Aimé Césaire. Trans. Annette Smith and Clayton Eshleman. 1939. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan UP, 2001. v–xiii.
An Anonymous Book
Encyclopedia of Virginia. New York: Somerset, 1993.
Beowulf. Trans. E Talbot Donaldson. Ed. Nicholas Howe. New York: Norton, 2001.
Hildegard of Bingen. Selected Writings. Trans. Mark Atherton. New York: Penguin, 2001.
A Book Published in a Second or Subsequent Edition
Bondanella, Peter. Italian Cinema: From Neorealism to the Present. 3rd ed. New York: Continuum, 2001.
A Multivolume Work
Blanco, Richard L, ed. The American Revolution, 1775–1783: An Encyclopedia. 2 vols. Hamden: Garland, 1993.
Crane, Stephen. The University of Virginia Edition of the Works of Stephen Crane. Ed. Fredson Bowers. 10 vols. Charlottesville: UP of Virginia, 1969–76.
- If you are using one volume of a multivolume work state the number of the volume:
Lawrence, D H. The Letters of D. H. Lawrence. Ed. James T Boulton. Vol. 8. New York: Cambridge UP, 2000.
A Book in a Series
Neruda, Pablo. Canto General. Trans. Jack Schmitt. Latin Amer. Lit. and Culture 7. Berkeley: U of California P, 1991.
A Republished Book
Atwood, Margaret. The Blind Assassin. 2000. New York: Knopf-Random, 2001.
A Book with Multiple Publishers
Wells, H G. The Time Machine. 1895. London: Dent; Rutland: Tuttle, 1992.
A Government Publication
Great Britain. Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. Dept. of the Environment, Transport, and the Regions. Our Countryside, the Future: A Fair Deal for Rural England. London: HMSO, 2000.
New York State. Commission on the Adirondacks in the Twenty-First Century. The Adirondack Park in the Twenty-First-Century. Albany: State of New York, 1990.
Poore, Benjamin Perley, comp. A Descriptive Catalogue of the Government Publications of the United States, September 5, 1774–March 4, 1881. US 48th Cong., 2nd sess. Misc. Doc. 67. Washington: GPO, 1885.
The Published Proceedings of a Conference
Freed, Barbara F, ed. Foreign Language Acquisition Research and the Classroom. Proc. of Consortium for Lang. Teaching and Learning Conf., Oct. 1989, U of Pennsylvania. Lexington: Heath, 1991.
Published conference paper
Hualde, Jose Ignacio. ‘Patterns of Correspondence in the Adaptation of Spanish Borrowings in Basque’. Proceedings of the Twenty-Fifth Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society, February 12–15, 1999: General Session and Parasession on Loan Word Phenomena. Ed. Steve S Chang, Lily Liaw and Josef Ruppenhofer. Berkeley: Berkeley Linguistics Soc., 2000. 348–58.
Unpublished conference papers
Give the title of the paper and conference, conference dates and place of conference, and add that it is an unpublished conference paper.
An Unpublished Dissertation
Boyle, Anthony T. ‘The Epistemological Evolution of Renaissance Utopian Literature, 1516–1657’. Diss. New York U, 1983.
A Published Dissertation
Dietze, Rudolf F. Ralph Ellison: The Genesis of an Artist. Diss. U Erlangen-Nürnberg, 1982. Erlanger Beiträge zur Sprach-und Kunstwissenschaft 70. Nürnberg: Carl, 1982.
JOURNALS AND NEWSPAPERS
An Article in a Journal with Continuous Pagination
Hanks, Patrick. ‘Do Word Meanings Exist?’ Computers and the Humanities 34 (2000): 205–15.
Mann, Susan. ‘Myths of Asian Womanhood’. Journal of Asian Studies 59 (2000): 835–62.
An Article in a Journal that pages each issue separately
Albada, Kelly F. ‘The Public and Private Dialogue about the American Family on Television’. Journal of Communication 50.4 (2000): 79–110.
- Some journals do not use volume numbers at all, numbering issues only. Treat the issue numbers of such journals as you would volume numbers.
An Article in a Newspaper
Jeromack, Paul. ‘This Once, a David of the Art World Does Goliath a Favor’. New York Times 13 July 2002, late ed.: B7+.
- Abbreviate months as follows: Jan., Feb., Mar., Apr., May, June, July, Aug., Sept., Oct., Nov., Dec.
An Article in a Magazine
Mehta, Pratap Bhanu. ‘Exploding Myths’. New Republic 6 June 1998: 17–19.
An Anonymous Article
‘Dubious Venture’. Time 3 Jan. 1994: 64–65.
A Special Issue
Perret, Delphine and Marie-Denise Shelton, ed. Maryse Conde. Spec. issue of Callaloo 18.3 (1995): 535–711.
Somin, Ilya. ‘Do Politicians Pander?’ State Autonomy. Spec. issue of Critical Review 14.2–3 (2000): 147–55.
A Legal Source
New York Times Co. v. Tasini. No. 00-201. Supreme Ct. of the US. 25 June 2001.
Basic Entry Document from Internet Site
Zeki, Semir. ‘Artistic Creativity and the Brain’. Science 6 July 2001: 51–52. Science Magazine. 2002. Amer. Assn. for the Advancement of Science. Accessed 24 Sept. 2002 <http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/293/5527/51>.
Entire Internet Site
Electronic Text Center. Ed. David Seaman. 2002. Alderman Lib., U of Virginia. Accessed 19 June 2002 <http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/>.
Nagata, Linda. Goddesses. 2000. Scifi.com. Accessed 4 Oct. 2002 <http://www.scifi.com/originals/originals_archive/nagata/>.
Keats, John. ‘Ode on a Grecian Urn’. Poetical Works. 1884. Bartleby.com: Great Books Online. Ed. Steven van Leeuwen. 2002. Accessed 5 May 2002 <http://www.bartleby.com/126/41.htm>.
United States. Dept. of Justice. Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention. Law Enforcement and Juvenile Crime. By Howard N Snyder. Dec. 2001. Accessed 29 June 2002 <http://www.ncjrs.org/pdffiles1/ojjdp/191031.pdf>.
Butler, Darrell L and Martin Sellbom. ‘Barriers to Adopting Technology for Teaching and Learning’. Educause Quarterly 25.2 (2002): 22–28. Educause. Accessed 3 Aug. 2002 <http://www.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/eqm0223.pdf>.
Publications on CD-ROM, Diskette or Magnetic Tape
Braunmuller, A R, ed. Macbeth. By William Shakespeare. CD-ROM. New York: Voyager, 1994.
- It is important to state the publication medium as different formats may vary.
Harner, James L. Email to the author. 20 Aug. 2002.