University of Aberdeen, Study notes of Medicine

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University of Aberdeen

Style Guide

Version 1

Jo Rostron, Mike McConnell

Contents

1.0 Introduction

This guide has been produced to promote a consistent style for University of Aberdeen publications and for the University‘s website and is based on commonly accepted standards such as those adopted by The Times and the BBC.

Just as we have a visual identity to make sure that we present a strong, consistent image to the world, so should we follow some basic guidelines when writing for the University. Our writing should be easy to read, easy to understand and presented in a consistent style that is familiar to most readers.

2.0 Rules

2.1 Abbreviations

Rule Wrong Right

Use of abbreviations should be kept to a minimum. Where abbreviations are used, punctuation should be avoided.

eg. or e.g. ie. or i.e. etc. or e.t.c. pp. or p.p.

eg ie etc pp viz et al

Abbreviations ‗ie‘ and ‗eg‘ do not carry punctuation but are preceded with a comma and space.

The book is long i.e. over 3, pages.

The book is long ie over 3, pages.

The book is long, ie over 3, pages.

Measurements should be treated similarly, with no full stops.

m.p.h. a.m. p.m. cm. mm. min. hr.

mph am pm cm mm min hr

Geographical abbreviations follow a similar style.

U.K.

U.S.A.

U.A.E.

UK

USA

UAE

Points of the compass should not be abbreviated in straight text and generally carry lower-case initials (see also Area Names).

North, South, East, West N, S, E, W n, s, e, w

north south east west

2.2 Acronyms and initialisms

Rule Wrong Right

Acronyms and initialisms should be set in capitals and should have no full stops and spaces between letters.

B.B.C.

N.A.L.G.O.

D.I.Y.

BBC

NALGO

DIY

For plurals of nouns that don‘t end in s, the apostrophe goes before the s.

The womens minibus runs on Fridays.

The women‘s minibus runs on Fridays.

Omission: Apostrophes are also used to show that letters are missed out of a word or phrase, usually to make it easier to pronounce.

Theyre

Wont

They‘re

Won‘t

Never use an apostrophe to form a plural with numbers and letters.

1990‘s

CD‘s

1990s

CDs

Its/It’s: Its means belonging to it.

It’s means it is.

The dog has it‘s bone.

Its cold today.

The dog has its bone.

It‘s cold today.

2.5 Area names

Rule Wrong Right

Official area names which include points of the compass should carry a capital initial, otherwise lower case should be used

south Yorkshire the west midlands western Australia

North-East

South Yorkshire the West Midlands Western Australia

north-east (if used to refer to this area follow with Scotland to avoid confusion)

Points of the compass not used as part of an area name should not carry a capital initial

the South of Scotland

North-East Scotland

the south of Scotland

north-east Scotland

2.6 Bullet points

Rule Wrong Right

Don‘t use ending punctuation for single words of short phrases in a list.

 Students.  Academics;  Staff.

 students  academics  staff

Where bullets form full sentences use an initial capital and full stop.

This style guide has many functions:

 its primary aim is to ensure consistency across the University‘s publications and the website and it will be made available to all staff

This style guide has many functions:

 Its primary aim is to ensure consistency across the University‘s publications and the website and it will be made available to all staff.

2.7 Capitals

Rule Wrong Right

Names: capitalise names, course titles, names of institutions etc but try to keep to a minimum.

principal

school of education

Principal

School of Education

Headings: Always write headlines and headings in lower case (after the first initial capital letter). The only exception to this is if there is a name within the heading.

Specific guidelines apply to menus and major headings on the website – see the Web Editors‘ Guide.

New Menu At Zeste.

NEW MENU AT ZESTE.

New menu at zeste.

New menu at Zeste.

When referring to a particular decade use, eg ‗sixties‘ or ‗1960s‘ (no apostrophe)

1960‘s 1960s

2.9 Department names

Rule Wrong Right

Please use these names in full. Do not use abbreviations (CASS, CLSM etc) unless for internal purposes only. Note capitalisation.

CASS

College of arts and social sciences

CLSM

College of Life Sciences & Medicine

College of Arts and Social Sciences

College of Life Sciences and Medicine

2.10 Full stops

Rule Wrong Right

Full stops should not be used after headings, subheadings, paragraph headings etc..

Page heading. Page heading

Only one space should be used in a sentence following a full stop

end of sentence. Start of new end of sentence. Start of new

Minimise use of full stops in abbreviations. Use only for clarification or to avoid misinterpretation, eg, ‗no‘ meaning ‗no‘ and ‗no.‘ meaning ‗number‘.

e.g. e.g

eg

2.11 Hyphenation

Rule Wrong Right

Keep hyphenation to the minimum to avoid ambiguity. Distinguish between ‗a man-eating tiger‘ and ‗a man eating tiger‘; ‗four year-old children‘ and ‗four-year-old children‘. Words such as ‗makeup‘ and ‗childcare‘ can be run together and written without a hyphen. ‗Part-time‘ and ‗full-time‘ need hyphens (both as nouns and adjectives), but ‗postgraduate‘ and ‗undergraduate‘ do not.

Part time

Full time student

Post-graduate

Under-graduate student

part-time

full-time student

postgraduate

undergraduate student

Ages as adjectives are hyphenated.

21 year old John Smith.

John Smith is 21-years-old.

21 - year-old John Smith.

John Smith is 21 years old.

2.12 Italics

Rule Wrong Right

Italicise Latin names, foreign words, ship names and titles of periodicals, works of art, films, plays, newspapers and books in preference to using quotation marks

‗The Times‘ War and Peace

The Times War and Peace

2.13 Job titles

Rule Wrong Right

Job titles should be capitalised where it is a specific person such as ‗Professor Smith is a Lecturer in Physics‘. General jobs such as ‗a professor‘ should be in lower case.

A Lecturer in Music.

Professor Smith, lecturer in music.

John Smith, head of admissions.

A lecturer in music.

Professor Smith, Lecturer in Music.

John Smith, Head of Admissions.

Titles which precede a name should also have initial capitals.

vice-chancellor Vice-Chancellor

2.14 Latin plurals

Rule Wrong Right

Many Latin plurals are commonly used in preference to the singular form: data , or conversely the singular form is pluralised: forums.

Being overly prescriptive can be off-putting to the reader, so where language has evolved we have adopted the approaches evident in common parlance.

fora

formulae

syllabi

data are

a datum

an alumuni

a criteria

forums

formulas

syllabuses

data is

data

an alumunus

a criterion

2.15 Numbers

Rule Wrong Right

Numbers, including ages, up to 10 should be spelled out in full, ie there are eight students , but figures should be used for 10 and above. However, figures should be used for statistics, money, weight, measurements.

There are 29 schools, 1 college and ten universities.

You will receive either £nine or £92.

The child is 6 years old.

There are 29 schools, one college and 10 universities.

You will receive either £9 or £92.

The child is six years old.

Never start a sentence with a number, always spell it out.

End of sentence. 12 people took part in the study…

End of sentence. Twelve people took part in the study…

‗Per cent‘ should be written as two words in full except in diagrams and tables. The symbol may also be used in headlines.

90% 90 per cent.

For purposes of clarity, numbers above 999 should carry a comma

There were 4285 students.

The project cost £15000.

There were 4,285 students.

The project cost £15,000.

Million/Billion should be written in full the first time it is used, thereafter a symbol of lowercase ‗m‘ or ‗bn‘ (no space) can be used. For thousands, ‗k‘ should not be used, instead use digits separated by a comma (eg £100,000).

First reference: 15million.

Thereafter: 15 m.

15k.

First reference: £15 million.

Thereafter: 15m.

15,00 0.

Decimal points should be preceded by a digit.

For currency, use either £ or p, but not both.

£3.50p £3. 56p

Spaces should not appear between figures and abbreviated measurements.

5 mm 10 cm 20 g

5mm 10cm 20g

Do not use spaces for % (only use symbol in tables, otherwise write per cent), temperatures or times.

30 ° F

50 ° C

9 am

30°F

50°C

9am

2.16 Plurals

Rule Wrong Right

Activities of groups such as research institutes, teams or schools should be reported as ‗the School is‘ not ‗the School are‘. Words such as ‗alumni‘ and ‗media‘ are plurals, but note exceptions under 2.14 Latin plurals.

All organisations and institutions are singular, and should be referred to as ‗it‘, not ‗they‘.

The University of Aberdeen are

The team are

The university is reviewing their

The University of Aberdeen is

The team is

The university is reviewing its

2.19 S or Z

Rule Wrong Right

Use s (British) rather than z (American) for words ending ‗ise‘.

The only exceptions are capsize and seize.

Recognize

realize

Organise

Recognise

2.20 Time

Rule Wrong Right

Avoid use of the 24 hour clock. There is no need for full stops or spaces between the number and am or pm. Use 12 noon.

10 a.m

10 am

10:

19:

10am

7pm

2.21 Specific points

Rule Wrong Right

Aberdeen University is not allowed.

The University of Aberdeen should be used at all times (the only exception is AUSA)

Aberdeen University,

Aberdeen Uni

University of Aberdeen

When referring to the University of Aberdeen in body text without using the full name, the word ‗University‘ should carry an initial capital.

When referring to universities in general, use lower case.

the university has produced this style guide (when referring to Aberdeen).

students at Universities in Scotland….

the University has produced this style guide.

students at universities in Scotland….

Note use of capitals and hyphen for the title ‗Vice- Chancellor‘ and ‗Vice- Principal‘.

Vice chancellor Vice-chancellor

Vice-Chancellor

Do not use hyphens in telephone numbers. Use brackets only for clarification of alternative digits in international dialling codes.

Keep email or web address hyperlinks as a single entity wherever possible. If it‘s unavoidable to break them across rows, break after the forward slash.

Never insert hyphenation to reflect a break as the hyperlink will not function.

http://www.abdn.ac.uk/ www.abdn.ac.uk

Do not include ‗http://‘ in web addresses unless the address doesn‘t begin with www in which case ‗http://‘ must be prefixed

http://www.aberdeensportsvillage.com/

studentmail.abdn.ac.uk

www.aberdeensportsvillage.com

http://studentmail.abdn.ac.uk/

Express ‗email‘ as one word (no hyphen), using upper case ‗E" only when at the start of a sentence.

Email can be used as both a verb and noun.

E-mail e-mail

email

Express ‗online‘ as one word.

on-line online

Express ‗website‘ as one word with lower-case initial.

web site Web site web-site

website

3.0 Quick Reference

3.1 A-Z

A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z

A

Wrong Right

Aberdeen University University of Aberdeen

@ Should never be used in place of ‗at‘

advisor adviser (but advisory)

alot (never) allot (unless in the context to distribute between or among)

a lot (two words meaning many)

all ready (unless used in context ‗we are all ready to‘)

already (means ‗by now‘, ‗even now‘, or ‗by then‘ eg ‗the course has already started‘)

alright all right

A-Level/ A-level A level (no hyphen, lower case l)

amidst amid

amongst among

an historic collection A historic collection (use only if h is silent, eg an honour)

any way (unless meaning ‗any method‘) Anyway (meaning regardless)

C

Wrong Right

carpark car park

co-operate cooperate

co-ordinate coordinate

college of arts & social sciences College of Arts and Social Sciences

college of physical sciences College of Physical Sciences

college of life sciences & medicine College of Life Sciences and Medicine

D

Wrong Right

degree classes – 2.1, 2.1 2:1, 2:

desk top desktop

Dr. Dr (no full stop)

E

Wrong Right

E-mail/e-mail email

e-learning, e-commerce eLearning, ecommerce

e.g. eg (use for example in preference)

Etc. etc (avoid if possible)

extra curricular extracurricular

F

Wrong Right

Freshers Week/ Fresher‘s Week Freshers‘ Week

field work fieldwork

figure head figurehead

fulltime/ full time full-time

fund raising fundraising

G

Wrong Right

Government government (lower case unless Scottish Government)

ground-breaking groundbreaking