Style guide of the Platypus Review

8.3

Style guide of the Platypus Review

1 BASICS

This style guide assumes the Chicago Manual of Style as its base.

2 CAPITALIZATION

2.1 Capitalization of “Left,” “Right,” and derivatives

We capitalize “Left,” “Right,” and their derivative forms (e.g., “socialist Left,” “Leftist politicians,” “Right-wing tendency”).

2.2 Capitalization of titles

We capitalize our own titles as if they were sentences. Note that we capitalize the first word after a colon or question mark that ends the main title.

“How long is the end of history?”
“The pandemic and the Left”
“Look where we are: An interview with Steve Roberts”

2.3 Non-capitalization of “race” colors

We do not capitalize “black,” “red,” “white,” nor any other color used as an adjective for “racial” groups of people (e.g., “anti-black racism,” “white electorate”) unless it is part of a proper noun (e.g., “the Black Hundreds,” “the Black Panthers”).

2.4 Sentences after colons

A sentence that immediately follows a colon does not need to be capitalized. Only in the title of a piece do we capitalize the word following a colon.

3 CHARACTERS

3.1 Diacritics

We use diacritics.

Café, façade, Jürgen, Kołakowski, Lukács, naïveté, raison d’être, résumé, Solidarność, Žižek.

3.2 Non-English words

If non-English words are commonly used in English such as “status quo,” “et cetera,” or “Gesundheit,” they do not need to be italicized. When they are less common, like “Selbstaufhebung” or “ad calendas graecas,” the non-English words should be italicized. If the non-English words make up a proper noun, they do not need to be italicized (e.g., “Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands”).

3.3 Superscripting

We superscript cardinal numbers (e.g., “21st century”).

4 CITATIONS

Submissions should use footnotes. We convert these to endnotes in our production process.

The superscripted number to indicate a footnote or endnote should generally come at the end of the sentence’s punctuation (including quotation marks). However, the number can be more specifically placed if appropriate.

If the text is readily available online, i.e., free to access and easy to find, we include its URL, wrapped in arrows: <URL_HERE>.

4.1 Citation examples

Article in a journal or review:

Chris Mansour, “Back to Enlightenment values: An interview with Brendan O’Neill,” Platypus Review 103 (February 2018), available online at <https://platypus1917.org/2018/02/03/back-enlightenment-values- interview-brendan-oneill/>.
E. P. Thompson, “The Moral Economy of the English Crowd in the Eighteenth Century,” Past & Present 50 (1971): 76, 78, 126.
Scott R. Nelson, “Who Put Their Capitalism in My Slavery?,” Journal of the Civil War Era 5, no. 2 (2015): 289–310.

Article from a news organization:

Amber Jameison, “Trump to Bernie Sanders supporters: ‘We welcome you with open arms,’” The Guardian, June 7, 2016, available online at <https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jun/07/donald-trump-bernie-sanders-supporters-clinton-nomination>.
“Bricks thrown, sponge bullets fired in Wellington unrest,” Otago Daily Times, March 2, 2022, available online at <https://www.odt.co.nz/star-news/star-national/bricks-thrown-sponge-bullets-fired-wellington-unrest>.
Michael Erman and Manas Mishra, “Pfizer expects 2021, 2022 COVID-19 vaccine sales to total at least $65 bln,” Reuters, November 2, 2021, available online at <https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/pfizer-raises-covid-19-vaccine-sales-forecast-36-billion-2021-11-02/>.

Book:

Theodor W. Adorno, Negative Dialectics, trans. E. B. Ashton (New York: Continuum, 1973), 21.
Wilhelm Reich, Massenpsychologie des Faschismus (Cologne: Kiepenheuer & Witsch, 1971), 221.
Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, ed. Edwin Cannan, M.A. LL.D. (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1976).

Edited book:

The Essential Frankfurt School Reader, eds. Andrew Arato and Eike Gebhardt (New York: Urizen Books, 1978).
The New Left Reader, ed. Carl Oglesby (New York: Grove Press, 1969).
The Idea of Communism, eds. Costas Douzinas and Slavoj Žižek (New York: Verso, 2010).

Part of a book:

Karl Marx, “Inaugural Address of the Working Men’s International Association,” in The Marx-Engels Reader, ed. Robert C. Tucker, 2nd ed. (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1978), 517, available online at <https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1864/10/27.htm>.
William H. Sewell Jr., “Toward a Post-Materialist Rhetoric for Labor History,” in Rethinking Labor History: Essays on Discourse and Class Analysis, ed. Lenard R. Berlanstein (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1993), 15–17, 26.

Shortened versions:

After the first citation, all further citations of the item can be shortened.

If a footnote cites the same page as the previous footnote, we use “Ibid.” If it is the same source, but a different page, we add the page: “Ibid., 93.”

Mansour, “Back to Enlightenment.”
Thompson, “Moral Economy,” 126.
Jameison, “Trump to Bernie Sanders.”
Marx, “Inaugural Address,” 517.

5 FORMATTING DIFFERENT SUBMISSIONS

5.1 Book reviews

We preface book reviews with a citation of the book. See the section on citations below for an example.

In the text, any citation of the work being reviewed should be done as page numbers in parentheses, followed by the punctuation:

He wrote, “misery of the working masses has not diminished” (13).

However, any other works should be cited as footnotes, following our usual conventions.

5.2 Articles

5.3 Interviews and panels

5.4 Wordcount limits

Interviews and panels can be compressed by cutting out filler words. Articles, however, must have their edits approved by the author before publication.

Articles should be less than 6,000 words.
Interviews should be less than 10,000 words.
Panels should be less than 12,000 words.

6 PUNCTUATION

6.1 Dashes and hyphens

Hyphen (-): used for, e.g., compound words. Note that when a compound word is made up of commonly associated words, an adverb, or a name, it does not need to be hyphenated.

“mid-19th century,” “Civil War history,” “poorly written essay”

En dash (–): used for ranges of numbers, dates, etc. We do not put spaces around an en dash unless it separates things made of multiple words.

“125–30,” “Monday–Friday,” “1903–12,” “December 2022 – January 2023”

Em dash (—): used to denote an aside or break. Note that we put a space around both sides of an em dash.

“The rest of the Left always ended up — especially in periods of electoral activity, general elections, etc. — tailing the Labour Party.”

6.2 Oxford comma

We use the Oxford comma because it functions as “syntactic sugar” to convey meaning that could be otherwise obscured by the oddities of writing.

6.3 Quotation marks

Quotation marks should be double inverted commas (“ ”) for quoting something. If there is a quote within the quoted material, it is wrapped in single inverted commas (‘ ’). In addition, be sure to use quotation marks that have a curve to them; do not use straight marks (" ").

6.4 Block quotes

The font size of block quotes should be slightly smaller than the body’s font size. The block quote should be indented from the left and right in its entirety.

6.5 Singular possessive for words ending with “s” or an “s”-sound

For the singular possessive, we add an apostrophe + “s” even to words that end in an “s” or sound like they do (e.g., “Engels’s book,” “Marx’s book”).

7 SPACING

The body of text should be double- or 1.5-spaced, including block quotes. Footnotes should be single spaced.

8 SPELLING

We use American English spelling conventions.

9 FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

If my submission is accepted, how long will it take to appear in the PR?

It will take at least a month if not longer, for a few reasons: we have a steady inflow of submissions, we need to design each issue for print, and the printing process can take several weeks.

What if I can’t find what I’m looking for in this style guide?

Refer to the Chicago Manual of Style.

1	BASICS
2	CAPITALIZATION
3	CHARACTERS
4	CITATIONS
5	FORMATTING DIFFERENT SUBMISSIONS
6	PUNCTUATION
7	SPACING
8	SPELLING
9	FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS