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Archiver > TMG > 2000-12 > 0975874834
From: John <>
Subject: [TMG] Which source template to use for re-edited book?
Date: Sun, 03 Dec 2000 15:20:34 -0500
Cheri,
Having no disagreement with your statement when dealing with quoted
material in legal or any other context, I do caution that you not
extrapolate those practices into the bibliographic realm.
Casting the title of a book in a footnote or bibliographic entry is not an
act of quoting from the original. Instead it transforms the title, as found
on the title page, to what is known as regular title, or headline
capitalization. The authorities are fairly unanimous in this, be it Chicago
Manual of Style, MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers, Evidence!, or
the section on capitalization included in most, recent editions
Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary.
For the details of regular title capitalization, see CMS 15.103 through
15.118. You will find the use of ellipses points (also used in quoted
material) suggested in 15.117 to shorten excessively long titles of works
published in earlier centuries. If you find Bible titles lengthy and
unedifying for genealogical purposes, you may choose to shorten them with
ellipses points. Elliptical treatment of these same titles might not be as
appropriate in a work studying Bibles marketed in eighteenth and nineteenth
century America.
Mills' treatment of title capitalization in Evidence! is at 36-37.
In short, in notes and bibliography, do not use square brackets to indicate
alterations in capitalization.
Put your best cites forward,
John Crawford
"Cheri Casper" wrote:
>In doing legal editing, when you modify the capitalization of something you
>put the letter in square brackets. Thus if a book title inadvertently lower
>cased the "p" in "pilgrims" you could correct it to read [P]ilgrims. That
>lets the reader know that you made the capitalization. I also use "sic" in
>italics to indicate incorrect spellings in original material.
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