SWET Style Sheet

May 31, 2014

SWET Style Sheet and Submission Guidelines
These guidelines are intended for articles published in SWET online and print publications (revised May 2014).

MATTERS OF STYLE
In general, follow the Chicago Manual of Style, 16th edition (CMS16). For spelling and hyphenation, follow Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, 11th edition. For style issues specific to material relating to Japan, see rules below (reference: SWET, Japan Style Sheet; hereafter JSS). Matters in question not detailed here will be resolved by the editor in consultation with the author and the SWET Editorial Team.

Spelling and Punctuation

Use U.S. punctuation and spelling (reference: Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, 11th edition).
Use the serial comma.
Use only one space after terminal punctuation (periods, question marks, and exclamation marks).

Article Titles and Subheads

Use the headline style of capitalization (CMS16 8.157) for article titles and subheads. Long articles should have two or more subheads to break up the text.

Numbers

Spell out numbers from one through ten; use numerals for 11 and up. This applies to both cardinal and ordinal numbers (nine pencils; the 12th edition).
Use numerals for percents (50 percent). Do not use the symbol % in running text.
Spell out ages (he was two; fifteen years of age); and ten-year age brackets (in their twenties).

Japanese Words

Use the old Hepburn system of romanization (use the “n rule”; see Japan Style Sheet). Italicize Japanese words, except for those defined in Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, 11th edition.
Ex: The tokonoma was fitted with a shoji window.
Do not italicize individual Japanese words or phrases that are already marked off from the text by quotation marks.
Ex: He said “Konnichiwa.” / This glass is called “giyaman.”
Do not italicize proper nouns.
Ex: Kyojin (baseball team), Horyoji temple. (Case where macrons are not used; see below)
Macrons are used to indicate long (extended) vowels. Be sure to have someone knowledgeable of Japanese check for accuracy.
Ex: Kyōjin (baseball team), Hōryūji temple.
Mac users may input macrons from the keyboard using the U.S. Extended keyboard or from pop-up menu of diacritical characters (Lion 10.7 and up); Windows users should copy/paste macron vowels using Character Map. See JSS update article for details.
Do not use macrons for geographical names that appear on international maps (Tokyo, Osaka, Kobe, Tohoku, Hokkaido, etc.), even if the text uses macrons for less familiar place names (Hyōgo, Chūō ward, Hamamatsu-chō).

Japanese Names
As a rule, use Japanese name order, surname first, followed by given name, using the Hepburn system of romanization: Suzuki Yasuko. However, respect a person’s preference for given-name-first: Yasuko Suzuki; or for Kunrei system of romanization: Yasko Sudzuki.

Decades and Centuries

Spell out decades (in lowercase) or use figures followed by an “s”: the twenties or the 1960s (not ‘20s, ‘60s).
Spell out centuries rather than use superscript feature (nineteenth-century prints; a twenty-first-century technology).

Dates

Dates should be given in Monday, Day, Year order: November 1, 1980
Inclusive dates should repeat the digits: 1980–2014

Names on Second Mention
In write-ups of activities, etc., use a surname alone (with no courtesy title) or a full name in referring to a speaker or an individual e.g., Adachi said, or, Barbara Adachi said (not Barbara said).

Abbreviations
U.S. as an adjective, United States spelled out as a noun.
The abbreviations “i.e.” and “e.g.” should always be followed by a comma.

Special Handling

Use curly or smart quotation marks, not straight quotation marks (reserve for inches/feet; min./sec.).
Capitalize “the” when it is the first word in the title of a book (CMS16 8.161) but use lowercase “the” when citing a periodical (CMS16 14.179), except when it is at the beginning of a sentence (e.g., “We cite The Chicago Manual of Style and the New York Times.”). Do not capitalize the “The” of formal titles of organizations in running text (She works for the Asia Foundation.). But, when giving an address, do capitalize “The” (The Asia Foundation, x-x-x Minami Aoyama, Tokyo).
Spell “email” and "ebook" as one word, no hyphen.
Do not include http:// or ftp:// in URLs unless “www” is not the first item, i.e., [url=http://monumenta.cc.sophia.ac.jp]http://monumenta.cc.sophia.ac.jp[/url].
Spell “website” as one word, lowercase; capitalize Internet, World Wide Web (three words), and the Web.
Capitalize and italicize the word “Newsletter” when referring to the SWET Newsletter as simply the Newsletter.
For a.m. and p.m., type in lower case with periods; for text intended for print, use small caps.
For capitalization in titles, refer to CMS16 rule 8.159. (Translation Issues in Twenty-First Century Japan).
“SWET Kansai” (without quotation marks) is the correct name for this branch organization.

Submitting the Manuscript
Please query the editor about a submission.

Please always submit manuscripts as digital files and send by email as an attached RTF or MS Word document. When only physical copy is available, please contact the editor for assistance with inputting.
Reprinted material from newspapers, magazines, etc.: send the reprint as an email attachment, not as text pasted into the body of an email message. Send a hard copy of the text by post (the quality of faxed material is not adequate for proofreading). The original is essential for the proofreader.
When submitting Japanese text, send as an email attachment, not as text pasted into the body of an email message. Send a hard copy of the original text by post or fax.

Copyright License
The acceptance of a manuscript for publication by SWET grants SWET the right to publish on its website and occasionally in print publications. Copyright remains with the author and appears on the publication as

Reprinting Copyrighted Material
Permission for use of previously published (copyrighted) material should be cleared with and obtained in writing from the author or original publisher before submitting articles. This includes, for example, Japanese text being reprinted or used for sample translation purposes, English text being reprinted, or photographs or other graphic material.

Permission request forms are available as Microsoft Word documents; please contact the SWET editor, and online as an Excel spreadsheet version.

PREPARING MANUSCRIPTS FOR DESIGN/LAYOUT
This section is primarily a tool for Editorial Team copyeditors and others who handle manuscripts in the final stages of the editorial and proofreading process.

Text Format

Margins should be unjustified (i.e., ragged right, also called “align left” in Microsoft Word).
Font size should be set at 12 points and line height at 18 points (not double- or 1.5-spaced).
The copyright sign, the copyright date, and the author’s name appear at the top of the article for the copyright notice.
An introduction of 30–50 words containing the keywords of the article and highlighting its attractions should be written and placed after the title, as it will appear in the first text seen by visitors to the website. If not provided by the author, this text should be prepared by the editor.
Articles should not begin with a subhead, i.e., a subhead cannot appear between the title and the first paragraph of text.
Leave a one-line space between the title and the body text; also leave a one-line space above subheads.
Paragraphs are indicated by an open line. Do not indent paragraphs, using spaces or tabs.
Ordinary roman, i.e., not italicized, text should be entered in a Latin-alphabet (English-language) font or as hankaku if an Asian version of Microsoft Word is used. Italics should be indicated by italicizing the text.

Special characters

Enter standard European-accented characters from the keyboard, e.g., vis-à-vis, résumé. For macrons and other diacritics, see above.
M dashes may be entered from the keyboard (—) or represented by two hyphens (—); in either case, no space precedes or follows the dash. N (en) dashes may be entered from the keyboard (–); in either case, no space precedes or follows the dash.
Single and double quotation marks should be entered from the keyboard (as curly or smart quotes), not straight quotes.

Graphics
Authors are encouraged to supply images to accompany their text. Please consult with the SWET editor regarding choice and format of images and where they should be sent.

Specifications for image data:

For a book cover and page from a book: a full-color scan, grayscale mode, TIFF format, 50 percent size of the cover, 300dpi resolution.
For an illustration or comic: a comic can be scanned at 100 percent of size depending on the original size. Also, if the illustration has been done digitally, the original vector art is preferable.
For a photo (color or b/w): TIFF or JPEG format. Check with editor about the images if the article is intended for print publication.
Credit/copyright notices and suggested captions should always be included.

Copyeditor’s Checklist for Finalizing Manuscripts for Publication
✓ Final draft has been checked by author.
✓ Permissions for use of all copyrighted material, text, or illustrations are on file.
✓ Correct copyright notice is provided.
✓ Introductory.
✓ Author’s name is included.
✓ Text beginning after headings is flush left; remaining paragraphs are indicated by open spaces.
✓ Double spaces are removed.
✓ If long text has no subheads, two or three are added. (There should never be only one subhead under a heading.)
✓ Credits and captions are provided for photos.