NOTES FOR AUTHORS

Specific Points

Abbreviations

Letters after a person’s name, without full stops or comma: (Philip Endean SJ)

No full stop in common abbreviations such as USA, UK, after titles such as Mr, Mrs, or after US states (Ma, Tx)

Avoid abbreviations of Latin phrases such as ‘e.g.’, ‘i.e.’: better to use a full English expression—‘for example’, ‘in other words’

Inclusive Language

The Way reserves the term ‘man’ for males

The Way prefers to avoid gender-specific pronouns with regard to God, but will respect the convictions of an author who wishes to maintain them. However, if the convention of referring to God as a male is kept, then please capitalize as ‘He’, ‘His’, to signal some kind of disanalogy—Jesus of Nazareth and Jesus Christ are ‘he’; ‘the Second Person of the Trinity’ is ‘He’.

Please avoid unduly cumbersome or pointed strategies. ‘They’ is normally preferable to ‘he/she’, ‘he or she’ or simply ‘she’

‘America’ is never used to refer only to the United States; please use US and US American

Italics are used for emphasis, book titles, or foreign words

Lists

If the items are named by complex phrases, please separate them with semi-colons Among the themes discussed were: the Franco dictatorship; the Poll Tax and its effect on the Thatcher government; the shortcomings of the Nixon presidency.

If the items listed are referred to in shorter phrases, please separate them with commas, including one before the final ‘and’ unless the sentence is perfectly clear without it: 'There were apples, pears and oranges in the fruit bowl'; BUT 'on the drinks tray, there was white wine from France, port from Portugal, and a liqueur from Eastern Europe'.

Numbers and Dates

One-word numbers are generally written out in full (six, seven).

Dates and other numbers are written in numerals (1976, 4,400 years, 23).

Ranges of numbers are written out numerically in full (17-19, 223-229).

Dates are generally written out as follows: 16 August 2000, 7 April 1976.

Punctuation

Dashes: please use ‘m’ dashes without space. ‘The Prime Minister—none other than Tony Blair—gave the speech.’

Hyphens should be used minimally; if in doubt omit. ‘Sixteenth-century English’, but ‘first class degree’.

Quotations and References

Please use footnotes rather than endnotes

Please try to follow UK conventions about quotation marks:

Single quotation marks, reserving double quotation marks for quotations within a quotation.

Final punctuation OUTSIDE the quotation mark, except where the quotation is a whole sentence or longer.

Brief references (biblical references, isolated page numbers) can be made within the text; anything longer becomes a note. When undisplayed, the reference comes within the final punctuation; when displayed, it comes within if the quotation is less than a full sentence, and outside if it is more.

Points of omission are indicated by an ellipsis (‘Ctl + Alt +'.' in MS Word). The ellipsis is treated as a word in its own right

Within a sentence it has a space either side

At the end of the sentence it is followed by a full stop

If it substitutes for the first words of a sentence, there is a space between it and the full stop at the end of the previous sentence (though we’ll avoid ‘…. …’)

Unless there seems some good reason in context, we will not scruple about capitalization at the beginning of such a sentence: 'The book is very good. … It is the best thing I have ever read … on the subject. … we need to do something with it.'

Displayed quotations are introduced:

with a comma if the syntax flows from the main text

otherwise with a colon

never with a point

Full bibliographical references are made in line with the following examples:

Article titles should not be followed by a comma if they end in punctuation (e.g. ‘?’ or ‘!’).

Places of publication should only include American states if there is danger of ambiguity (Cambridge, Ma), or if the place is very unfamiliar. Please use the form ‘Ma’, ‘Tx’, etc., with no full stop.

Publishers: ‘Press’ is generally omitted. Use ‘UP’ for ‘University Press’, and abbreviate further if publisher is obvious from place of publication, e.g. (Oxford: OUP, 2001), but (New York: Oxford UP, 2001)

Page references: do not use ‘p.’ or ‘pp.’; please avoid using ‘ff.’

Repeat citations should be cited using surname and brief title (Dickens, Bleak House, 445). Never use ibid., and consolidate successive citations of the same text where possible.

Scripture should be cited as follows: Matthew 5:1-6; 2 Maccabees 7:4-7, with less than a full space between colon and verse number (this can be adjusted during copyediting). NRSV unless good reason otherwise

Ignatian texts can be cited as: Exx 15.1; Constitutions X.1.1 [810]; Diary, 15 February 1544. Note that verses are separated by a point, not a colon.

The preferred translation for the Exercises is Elder Mullan (in the Fleming parallel edition); but Jules Toner should be used for the Discernment Rules.

MHSJ as: MHSJ EI 12, 456; MHSJ MN 5, 556-557.

Spiritual Exercises, italicised and always in full, refers to the text; 'Exercises' or 'Spiritual Exercises' refers to the process. 

Dir refers to the Ignatian Directories, and cite by document and paragraph number as given in Palmer or MHSJ; authors may also be mentioned.

Simplicity

The Way has a preference for simple, short sentences

In general, there should be no more than one qualifying phrase or clause before the main clause of a sentence: ‘According to the authors, since the end of the Second World War the world has got worse’ should be changed to ‘According to the authors, the world has got worse since the end of the Second World War’.

Similarly, the main verb of a subordinate clause should not be too far from its conjunction: ‘The authors think that the world is a great deal worse since the Second World War ended’ is better than ‘The authors think that, since the Second World War ended, the world is a great deal worse’.

In general, avoid the construction of two prepositional phrases governing the same noun: ‘fear and avoidance of conflict’, but ‘nervousness about conflict and (indeed?) avoidance of it’, not ‘nervousness about and avoidance of conflict’.

In lists, repeat prepositions unless the meaning is immediately clear. 'The book came from Mary and me' is OK, but not 'The book is about plaster of Paris and papier maché'--we need a second 'about' to make it quite clear that the papier maché does not come from Paris.

Subtitles should break up the text at appropriate points. We prefer not to introduce numbering or different levels of subtitle unless clearly necessary, though we do have provision for sub-subtitles.

Spelling

The Way follows modern British spelling, even in quotations, unless there is reason for special provision—the Oxford Dictionary for Writers and Editors is taken as authoritative, though we prefer judgment to judgement.

‘-ise’ is used when the root derives from Latin (realise, recognise, pace OED); ‘-ize’ when it derives from Greek (emphasize, analyze)

Possessives of nouns ending in ‘s’ take the form s’ (Jesus’, Ignatius’)

Single consonants should be used in words like ‘focusing’

Upper Case—if in doubt, stay lower case

‘Church’ to refer to a faith grouping (the Church of England); ‘church’ to a building

‘Bible’, ‘Scripture’, but ‘biblical’, ‘scriptural’.

generally ‘incarnation’, ‘atonement’, ‘christology’, ‘christological’, ‘passion’, ‘resurrection’

‘The Gospel of St John’ (text), but ‘the gospel (good news) proclaimed by Jesus Christ’.

The Archbishop of Canterbury and Bishop McGarry (personal identifiers) were present, as well as several other archbishops and bishops (offices)

All but minor words in English-language book and article titles, and in subtitles within the article, are upper case: ‘The Importance of Being Earnest’. Foreign titles follow the conventions normal in the original language.