Style guide

Style guides (or style manuals) are prevalent for general and specialized usage, for the general reading and writing audience and for students and scholars of the various academic disciplines, medicine, journalism, the law, government, business, and industry.

Publishing house style guides outline standards for design and writing for a specific publication or organization. Some focus on graphic design, covering such topics as typography and white space. Web site style guides focus on a publication's visual and technical aspects, prose style, best usage, grammar, punctuation, spelling, and fairness.

Editions

Many style guides are revised periodically to accommodate changes in conventions and usage. For example, the stylebook of the Associated Press is updated annually.

Academia and publishing

Publishers' style guides establish house rules for language usages, such as spelling, italics, and punctuation; consistency is the major purpose of these style guides. They are rulebooks for writers, ensuring consistent language. Authors are asked or required to use a style guide in preparing their work for publication; copy editors are charged with enforcing the publishing house's style.

Academic organization and university style guides are rigorous about documentation formatting style for citations and bibliography used for preparing term papers for course credit and manuscripts for publication. Professional scholars are advised to follow the style guides of organizations in their disciplines when they submit articles and books to academic journals and academic book publishers in those disciplines for consideration of publication. Once they have accepted work for publication, publishers provide authors with their own guidelines and specifications, which may differ from those required for submissions, and editors may assist authors in preparing their work for press. (Indexing, which can be a tedious task, is done either by the author for his or her own work, resulting in its being "self-indexed", or by a professional editorial indexer.)

General interest

The general public is the audience for some style guides; these may adopt the approaches of publishing houses and newspapers. Others, such as Fowler's Modern English Usage, 3rd ed., report how language is practiced in a given area and outline how phrases, punctuation, and grammar are actually used.

About Fowler's Modern English Usage Robert Burchfield states: "Linguistic correctness is perhaps the dominant theme of this book," adding the following qualification: "I believe that 'stark preachments' belong to an earlier age of comment on English usage." Commenting in the New Yorker, John Updike observes: "To Burchfield, the English language is a battlefield upon which he functions as a non-combatant observer."

Specialized guides

Some organizations other than the aforementioned ones produce style guides for either internal or external use. For example, communications and public relations departments of business and nonprofit organizations have style guides for their publications (newsletters, news releases, Web sites), and organizations advocating for social minorities establish what they believe to be fair and correct language treatment of their audiences.

Graphic design style guides

Many publications (notably newspapers) use graphic design style guides to demonstrate the preferred layout and formatting of a published page. They often are extremely detailed in specifying, for example, which fonts and colours to use. Such guides allow a large design team to produce visually consistent work for the organization.

Examples of style guides

International standards

Several basic style guides for technical and scientific communication have been defined by international standards organizations. These are often used as elements of and refined in more specialized style guides that are specific to a subject, region or organization. Some examples are:

• ISO 8 — Presentation of periodicals
• ISO 18 — Contents lists of periodicals
• ISO 31 — Quantities & units
• ISO 214 — Abstracts for publication & documentation
• ISO 215 — Presentation of contributions to periodicals & other serials
• ISO 690 — Bibliographic references — Content, form & structure
• ISO 832 — Bibliographic references — Abbreviations of typical words

• ISO 999 — Index of a publication
• ISO 1086 — Title leaves of a book
• ISO 2145 — Numbering of divisions & subdivisions in written documents
• ISO 5966 — Presentation of scientific & technical reports
• ISO 6357 — Spine titles on books & other publications
• ISO 7144 — Presentation of theses & similar documents
• ISO 9241 — Ergonomics of Human System Interaction
• EN-15038:2006 — Draft European Standard for Translation Services Annex D (informative)

Canada

Newspapers

• CP Stylebook: Guide to newspaper style in Canada maintained by the Canadian Press. ISBN 0920009387.
• The Globe and Mail Style Book: Originally created to help writers and editors at the Globe and Mail present clear, accurate, and concise stories. ISBN 0771056850

United Kingdom

General

• Fowler's Modern English Usage. Ed. R. W. Burchfield. Rev. 3rd ed. London: Clarendon Press, 2004. ISBN 0-19-861021-1 (hardcover). Based on Fowler's Modern English Usage, by Henry Watson Fowler.
• The King's English, by Henry Watson Fowler and Francis George Fowler.
• The Oxford Style Manual (2003 ed.). Combines The Oxford Guide to Style and The Oxford Dictionary for Writers and Editors, which concentrates on common problems.
• Plain Words, by Sir Ernest Gowers.
• Usage and Abusage, by Eric Partridge.

Journalism

• The BBC News Style Guide. British Broadcasting Corporation.
• The Economist Style Guide: from The Economist (UK).
• The Guardian Style Guide: from The Guardian (United Kingdom)
• The Times Style and Usage Guide. The Times.

United States

In the United States, the two most widely-used style guides are the Chicago Manual of Style and the Associated Press stylebook. Most newspapers base their styles upon the Associated Press but also have their own style guides for local terms and individual preferences. The Elements of Style, by William Strunk, Jr. and E.B. White, is considered a classic style guide for the general public, and remains a popular book in high schools and college bookstores.

General writing style guides

• Bryson's Dictionary of Troublesome Words: A Writer's Guide to Getting It Right. By Bill Bryson.
• The Classics of Style. The American Academic Press, 2006. ISBN 0-9787282-0-3. Presents writing guidance from William Strunk, Jr., Emerson, Whitman, Poe, and other writers.
• The Elements of Style. By William Strunk, Jr. and E. B. White. (Often referred to as "Strunk and White".)

Editorial style guides on preparing a manuscript for publication

• The Chicago Manual of Style. Pref. Margaret Mahan. 15th ed. University of Chicago Press, 2003. ISBN 0-226-10403-6 (hardcover).
• Words into Type. By Marjorie E. Skillin, Robert M. Gay, et al. 3rd ed. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1974. ISBN 0139642625 (10). ISBN 978-0139642623 (13).

Legal style guides

• The Bluebook: A Uniform System of Citation. New York: Harvard Law Review Association in conjunction with the Columbia Law Review, the University of Pennsylvania Law Review, and The Yale Law Journal.

Journalistic style guides

• The Associated Press Stylebook. Foremost guide to newspaper style in the United States maintained by the Associated Press (AP).
• The New York Times Manual of Style and Usage. Eds. Allan M. Siegal and William G. Connolly. Rev. ed. New York: Times Books, 1999. ISBN 0-8129-6388-1.
• The Wall Street Journal Guide to Business Style and Usage. Ed. Paul R. Martin. New York: Free Press, 2002. ISBN 0743212959 (10). ISBN 978-0743212953 (13).

Electronic publishing style guides

• The Columbia Guide to Online Style. By Janice Walker and Todd Taylor. New York: Columbia University Press, 1998. ISBN 0-231-10789-7 (paperback). ISBN 0-231-10788-9 (hardback).
• Web Style Guide: Basic Design Principles for Creating Web Sites. 2nd ed. B Patrick J. Lynch and Sarah Horton. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2002.

Computer industry (software and hardware) style guides

• Read Me First! A Style Guide for the Computer Industry. 2nd ed. Sun Technical Publications/Prentice Hall, 2003. ISBN 0-13-142899-3. Provides comprehensive guidelines for documenting computer products, from writing about web sites to legal guidelines, from writing for an international audience, to developing a documentation department.
• Microsoft Manual of Style for Technical Publications. Microsoft Press. 2003. 3rd ed. (Book and CD). ISBN 0-7356-1746-5. Provides a style standard for technical documentation, including: use of terminology; conventions, procedure, and design treatments; and punctuation and grammar usage.

Academic

• ACS Style Guide. Style for scientific papers published in journals of the American Chemical Society.
• American Medical Association Manual of Style. Style for medical papers published in journals of the American Medical Association.
• American Sociological Association Style Guide. Academic style for the social sciences by the American Sociological Association.
• APA style. Academic style for the social sciences by the American Psychological Association.
• The Chicago Manual of Style. Style required by some academic publishers for books and journal publications. (See "Editorial style guides" above.)
• Geoscience Reporting Guidelines. Style and guidelines for writers & editors of geoscience reports (in industry, academic, and other disciplines).
• MHRA Style Guide: academic style for the arts and humanities published by the Modern Humanities Research Association; available for free download (see article); based in the United Kingdom.
• MLA Style Manual and MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers. Academic style for the arts and humanities by the Modern Language Association of America.
• Scientific Style and Format: The CSE Manual for Authors, Editors, and Publishers, 7th ed. Style for scientific papers published by the Council of Science Editors (CSE), a group formerly known as the Council of Biology Editors (CBE).
• The Style Manual for Political Science. Academic style used by many American political science journals, published by the American Political Science Association.
• Turabian style refers to A Manual for Writers of Term Papers, Theses, and Dissertations, by Kate L. Turabian, the graduate school dissertation secretary at the University of Chicago from 1930 to 1958. The school required her approval for every master's thesis and doctoral dissertation. Her stylistic rules closely follow those in The Chicago Manual of Style, although there are differences (See Turabian).

See also

• English writing style
• Diction
• Grammar
• Disputed usage

• Prescription and description
• Punctuation
• Spelling
• Stylistics

External links

General use of style guides

• Stylebook Advice: Tips on Creating, Revising and Using Style Guides. Report from a conference session by the American Copy Editors Society.

American English

• Style Manuals & Guides listed by The University of Memphis libraries.
• Bartleby Searchable Usage Guides.

U.S. government publications

• U.S. Government Printing Office Style Manual.

Australian English

• Queensland Government Style Guide.

British English

• The BBC News Styleguide.
• Economist.com Style Guide.
• The Guardian Stylebook.
• The Times Style and Usage Guide (online version; available as printed book as well).
• English Style Guide ("A handbook for authors and translators in the European Commission" – "Executive branch of the European Union.")

Canadian English

• CP Stylebook.
• York University Style Guide – Adapts CP Stylebook for university student use.

International organizations

• International Telecommunications Union English-language style guide (Microsoft Word format).
• WHO English Style Guide (PDF format)
• EU Interinstitutional Style Guide.

Academia

• "Style Manuals and Writing Guides" from the California State University, Los Angeles Library.
• "Citing sources" Online research tutorial to documentation style guides from Cornell University Libraries.

Medical journals

• International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICJME) Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals (Updated Feb. 2006).
• ICJME Uniform Requirements: Sample References.

Scientific journals

• Advances in Physics - Style Guide for Physics journal published by Taylor & Francis Group (Taylor & Francis journals).
• The Lancet: Formatting Guidelines for Authors: Formatting Guidelines for Electronic Submission of Revised Manuscripts.
• Nature Formatting Guide for Nature. (MS Word document file.)

WWW

• OSNews Style Guide: Rules and Guidelines for Publishing and Participating on OSNews, by T. Holwerda. OSNews, 2007.
• Web Style Guide, 2nd ed., by Patrick Lynch and Sarah Horton.