Style Guide
Titles
Titles should be concise, specific, and informative and should contain
the keypoints of the work. They must comprise of 16 words at most. Please capitalise each first character in each noun in the title, but please do not input your title in ALL CAPS. For guidance on how to write an acceptable title please read this paper.
Examples:
Law as a Game of Chance: Rabelais’ Bridlegoose and DC’s Two-Face
An Archive of the New: A Review of Key Terms in Comics Studies
Abstract
Abstracts must summarise the main arguments and conclusions and contain 200 words at most. Please do not italicise all the text of your abstract. For guidance on what makes an acceptable abstract, please read this paper.
Example:
The Batman villain Two-Face and Rabelais’ Bridlegoose in The Third Book of Pantagruel ([1546]1894) are identified with the law – or at least, the law distorted, exaggerated, caricatured. Two-Face decides matters based on the tossing of a double-faced coin, one side of which is defaced; in some respects, he is the successor to Rabelais’ Judge Bridlegoose, who decides the judicial cases before him by a throw of the dice. They both surrender their decision-making to the aleatory, in a manner that prompts us to gaze upon (or askance at) the [im]possible moment of decision. This article takes a comparative approach to draw out how these two characters illuminate broader questions of law and justice, through considerations of parody, satire, deconstruction, and play, having significance for the philosophy of law.
Headings
Capitalise all nouns, pronouns, adjectives, verbs, adverbs, and subordinate conjunctions (‘as’, ‘because’, ‘although’).
Use lowercase for all articles, coordinate conjunctions (‘and’, ‘but’, ‘or’), and prepositions.
Examples:
Coming to Terms: The Rhetoric of Narrative in Fiction and Film
In the Studio: Visits With Contemporary Cartoonists
Book reviews
If you are submitting a book review, the title should read: 'Short title of your choice. A Review of [Name of book]'.
Then, as a subtitle, include the following: Author, publisher, extent, publication year, ISBN (13-digit). Additional information (if applicable): Editor, photographer, translator, number of black and white and colour illustrations.
American vs British spelling
You must submit your article in English. You are welcome to use American or British spelling and grammar, as long as you use either consistently. Key differences include:
- programme (UK) vs. program (US)
- labour (UK) vs. labor (US)
- centre (UK) vs. center (US)
- mobilise (UK) vs. mobilize (US)
- 13 January 2011 (UK) vs. January 13, 2011 (US)
Whether you decide to use American or British spelling, keep the original, official spelling of proper nouns and institutions. For instance, it is 'Alliance of Digital Humanities Organizations', not 'Alliance of Digital Humanities Organisations'.
Numbers
You can use either words or figures to represent large numbers (i.e. one million or 1,000,000), as long as usage is consistent within an article. For numbers between zero and twelve, use words rather than figures.
When referring to a percentage, use ‘per cent’ rather than ‘%’.
Exceptions: Use figures and ‘%’ when the number is part of a dataset or presented in a table.
Currencies
Use ‘£’ for British pound sterling and ‘€’ for Euro, e.g., £50, €100. However, use ‘US$’, ‘C$’, ‘NZ$', ‘A$’ to distinguish between different dollar currencies.
Quotation marks
Use single quotation marks except for quotes within another quote. Use double quotation marks in that case.
Acronyms and initialisms
Spell out acronyms or initialisms on first use, followed directly by the acronym or initialism in brackets. Use the acronym or initialism for all subsequent references.
Example: 'The British Film Institute (BFI) is to release a series of archive films from the 1950s. A BFI spokesperson said etc.'
You do not need to spell out ‘US’, ‘UK’, ‘EU’, ‘UN’ and ‘DC’, as in ‘Washington, DC’.
Tables
Follow the guidelines for images to submit tables.
Where appropriate, submit the source dataset, e.g., as a .csv file. Once logged in, submit datasets as supplementary files.
Reference and cite any data and datasets according to the referencing guidelines below.
Datasets should not repeat what is already in the article.
Footnotes/Endnotes
Use endnotes rather than footnotes. Refer to them as ‘Notes’ at the end of the article, before ‘References’.
Clarify crucial information in the main text rather than in the endnotes.
For references, use in-text citations instead of endnotes.
In-text citations
Use parenthetical citations, following Harvard style – for example, ‘(Adam 1984: 120)’. For more on how to reference using Harvard style, see The Open University Harvard guide to citing references [PDF].
For publications by organisations, use the short form of the organisation’s name, its acronym or initialism instead of the full name. For instance, write ‘(CBLDF 2000)’ rather than ‘(Comic Book Legal Defense Fund 2000)’.
Include URLs (web addresses) in the ‘References’ section rather than in parenthetical citations.
In-text citations must match the entries in the ‘References’ section.
References
At the end of the article, list all references cited in the text and only those. The list must be in alphabetical order of the authors’ surnames.
When listing multiple works by the same author, re-type the author’s name for each entry, rather than use a long dash.
Include any works mentioned in the manuscript, such as films, videos, recordings, theatre productions, exhibitions, blog posts, web sites, artworks, and so on.
On how to reference comic books and comics material, see Comic Art in Scholarly Writing: A Citation Guide.
Where available, provide DOIs and URLs at the end of the relevant reference, and last date of access. Avoid hyperlinking as a substitute for in-text references, as hyperlinks often break.
Reference examples
Books
Gordon, I Jancovich, M and McAllister, M P (eds.) 2007 Film and Comic Books. Jackson: University of Mississippi Press.
Achebe, C 1995 Colonialist Criticism. In: Ashcroft, B et al The Post Colonial Studies Reader. London: Routledge.
Ward, G 1998 Publishing in the Digital Age. How Digital Technology is Revolutionising the World of Books, Magazines, Newspapers and Printing. London: Bowerdean.
Chapters within edited books
Samson, C 1970 Problems of information studies in history. In: S. Stone, ed. 1980. Humanities information research. Sheffield: CRUS. pp.44-68.
Journal articles
Martin, L 2010 Bombs, bodies and biopolitics: Securitizing the subject at airport security. Social and Cultural Geography, 11(1): 17-34. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14649360903414585.
Labarre, N 2013 Incomplete descriptions in Raymond’s Secret Agent X-9. The Comics Grid: Journal of Comics Scholarship 3(1):5, DOI: https://doi.org/10.5334/cg.ae
Comics and images from comics publications
Clowes, D 2008 Ghost World: Special Edition. Seattle: Fantagraphics.
Fox, G F (w), Sekowsky, M (p), and Sachs, B (i). The Wheel of Misfortune. Justice League of America #6 Aug.-Sep. 1961 National Comics Publications [DC Comics].
Starlin, J (w, p, i) Weiss, A (i) 1975 The Judgment!. Strange Tales, 180. Marvel Comics.
Munroe, R 2010 Morning. xkcd. Available at: http://xkcd.com/395/.
Newspaper articles
Tate, P 2007 Illicit organ trade increasing. The Jordan Times, 6 June, p. 3.
The Guardian 2010 Apple's iPads sales break the two million mark. 31 May. Available at https://www.theguardian.com/business/2010/may/31/ipad-apple-tablet-sales. [Last accessed 9 August 2013].
Vincent, P L 2009 Spinning a dark web of fun. The Hindu, 24 September. Available at https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/youth/Spinning-a-dark-web-of-fun/article16894164.ece. [Last accessed 3 June 2021].
Conference papers
Lynch, M 2003 Dialogue in an age of terror. In: The Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, Philadelphia, PA on 18 August 2003, pp. 4-7.
Zaffran, M 2010 Graphic Medicine. In: Comics and Medicine: Medical Narrative in Graphic Novels conference, Institute of Advanced English Studies, London on 17 June 2010.
Organisational publications/Grey literature
World Health Organization 2010 The world health report – Health systems financing: the path to universal coverage. Geneva, Switzerland: WHO.
Theses and dissertations
Yudis, A 2004 Failed responsibility of the media in the war on Iraq. Unpublished thesis (PhD), University of Manchester.
Tinker, E 2009 Identity and Form in Alternative Comics, 1967 - 2007. (PhD), University College London. Available at: http://emmatinker.oxalto.co.uk/ [Last accessed 9 August 2013].
Online resources, such as web pages, PDFs or blog posts
Tauber, M 2009 Lucy Shelton Caswell Interview - part 1. 30 January 2009. Available at: http://matttauber.blogspot.com/2009/01/lucy-shelton-caswell-interview-part-1.html . [Last accessed 16 October 2012]
Wikipedia Comic book. Available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comic_book. [Last accessed 9 August 2013].
Monkey See Videos 2008 How to Protect Comic Books. Available at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVqm9B76LMI [Last accessed 20 October 2009]
Data repositories
Priego, E (2021): The Comics Grid Number of Published Articles per Volume 2013-2021. figshare. Dataset. https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.17153000.v1