Author Guidelines

3.1 Author Guidelines

This style sheet is intended to facilitate the process of contributing manuscripts to Prooftexts. If questions arise that are not answered here, please consult The Chicago Manual of Style (16th edition).

1.  Format

Please double-space the entire manuscript—including all quoted passages and endnotes, with generous margins. Do not justify the right margin. The entire manuscript should be numbered.

We have a “blind-blind” review process and therefore the manuscript should not contain any overt indication as to its author. Please make sure to remove author identification from the document properties. For assistance with this, see https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Remove-hidden-data-and-personal-information-by-inspecting-documents-356b7b5d-77af-44fe-a07f-9aa4d085966f.

2.  Spelling and Usage

American, not British, spelling should be used, except in direct quotations. Use the first listings in Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate (11th edition), Random House, or American Heritage dictionaries. For proper names, consult the Encyclopaedia Judaica.

Be aware that the Encyclopaedia Judaica and Prooftexts sometimes eschew phonetic logic; thus, Berdyczewski rather than Berdichewsky. If in doubt, feel free to query the copyeditor for a decision.

In questions of American versus British usage, American should be chosen: double quotation marks (not ‘thus’ but “thus”); closing quotation marks should follow commas and periods (“Hello,” she said; rather than “Hello”, she said).

3.  Numbers and Dates

August 1937 (no comma); 1980s (no apostrophe); 1925–32, 1875–1910

Inclusive numbers: 71–74 (use all digits for figures less than 100); 107–8 (use changed part only, omitting unneeded zeros); 100–104 (use all digits if first figure is 100 or multiple of 100); 117–18, 415–532 (use two or more digits). For more information, see Chicago Manual, 16th edition, 9.60.

4.  Abbreviations

Biblical verses follow the style of Chicago Manual, 16th ed., 10.46, 1st style (e.g., Deut., Exod.) and 14.253. References to whole books of the Bible are spelled out; exact references employ abbreviations, e.g., Exod. 5:8; 1 Sam. 3:7; Isa. 60:7–9.

Talmudic tractates are treated the same as books of the Bible, i.e., they are not italicized: Shabbat 63a.

5.  Endnotes

In documentation as well as in other matters, Prooftexts follows Chicago Manual rather than MLA specifications. Therefore, we ask that you use endnotes instead of attaching a bibliography. Note references should be indicated in the text by numerical superscript, like this.¹ The endnotes themselves should begin a new page at the end of the manuscript text under the heading NOTES and must be double-spaced. If you wish to prefix an acknowledgment or general comment to the notes, place it, unnumbered, at the head of the notes proper. Following are some model endnotes:

For a book: Gershom Scholem, On the Kabbalah and Its Symbolism (New York: Schocken, 1965), 32–86.

For a book in several volumes: Max Weinreich, Geshikhte fun der yidisher shprakh (New York: YIVO, 1973), 2:232–34.

For an essay in a journal: Dan Pagis, “Trends in the Study of Medieval Hebrew Literature,” AJS Review 4 (1979): 125–41.

For an essay or chapter in a book: Robert F. Sayre, “Autobiography and the Making of America,” in Autobiography: Essays Theoretical and Critical, ed. James Olney (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1980), 146–49.

A foreign title of a book, play, or periodical should be italicized and transliterated (if necessary), and only the first word of the title and subtitle and proper nouns should be capitalized. Do not translate title into English.

In the endnotes, you should always cite the titles of articles, books, newspapers, and journals in a work's original language. In many cases, this will necessitate citing all bibliographic details of the reference in transliterated Hebrew, Yiddish, or Arabic:

See Carmi Horowitz, "'Al perush ha'aggadot shel haRashba--bein kabbalah lefilosofyah," Da'at 18 (1986-87): 15-25.

For titles of essays, short stories, and poems written in a foreign language, follow instructions above for title of book, play or periodical, but enclose title in quotation marks and do not italicize: Jacob Fichmann, “Al shirat ha’ahavah besifrut Yisra’el,” in Shirei ahavah beYisra’el (Jerusalem: [Pub. Name], 1948), 1–2.

In all instances, do not omit the original title by translating it into English and adding the note "(Hebrew)" in parentheses. There may be occasional times in which a translation may be wanted as well (if the meaning is not apparent from the context), but the original language must be there.

Abbreviations for notes: The first citation of any work should always be given in full. If that work is a primary focus of the article, you can add that “subsequent references will be given in parentheses in the text”; if not, give subsequent citations as abbreviated endnotes (that is, of course, if “ibid.” does not apply). In such cases, the author’s surname is usually sufficient to identify the work. However, when more than one work by a given author has been cited, the title must be indicated at each citation, although in shortened form. For example, if the first citation were: Michael Fishbane, “Composition and Structure in the Jacob Cycle,” Journal of Jewish Studies 26 (1975): 14–38, the second citation might be shortened to: Fishbane, “The Jacob Cycle,” 30.

6.  Reviews

The format for reviews is different. The title or titles under review should appear above the body of the text in the following form:

Grace Farrell Lee. From Exile to Redemption: The Fiction of Isaac Bashevis Singer. Carbondale and Edwardsville: Southern Illinois University Press, 1987, 129 pp.

David Neal Miller, ed. Recovering the Canon. Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1986, xxi + 154 pp.

7.  Transliteration

Since so many of the articles published in Prooftexts deal with Hebrew and Yiddish literature, we have appended charts to assist in the transliteration of the aleph-bet to the Latin alphabet. Please use the transliterated forms of terms and titles from Hebrew, Yiddish, and other languages with non-Latin alphabets, referring to the charts below for guidance.

Note that in transliteration of Yiddish and Hebrew titles, only the first word is capitalized, except for proper nouns.

For the format of foreign titles in endnotes, see “Endnotes” above. In the article proper, follow the format above, but provide a translation in parentheses instead of in brackets.

Short story: “Metei midbar” Novel: Oreiaḥ natah lalun

 

 

The Romanization of Hebrew
Consonants		Vowels
א	’ EXCEPT IN A BEGINNING OF A WORD
בּ	B	ָ;ַ;ֲ	a
ב	V
ג	G	ֱ,ֶ,ֶי	e
ד	D
ה	H	ֵ,ֵי	ei
ו	V
ז	Z	Vocal ְ	e  (silent shva is not rendered)
ח	Ḥ
ט	T	ִ,ִי	i
י	Y
כּ, ךּ	K	ֳ,ָ,וֹ,ֹ	o
כ,ך	KH
ל	L	וּ,ֻ	u
מ,ם	M
נ,ן	N	Special Situations
ס	S
ע	‘	ָה	ah
פּ	P
פ,ף	F	ֶה	eh
צ,ץ	TS
ק	Q	ָיו	av
ר	R
שׁ	SH	ֵי	ay
שׂ	S
תּ,ת	T
ג'	G’	הּ	h
ז'	Z’
צ'	TS’

 

Makef	Hyphen
Dagesh forte	Doubling
Prefixes	Connected
Capitalization	As one would in English (i.e. proper names)

 

The Romanization of Yiddish
א	Omitted	Words of Hebrew-Aramaic origin, which in Yiddish retain their traditional spelling; are transcribed as pronounced: Consult Uriel Weinreich, Modern English-Yiddish Yiddish-English Dictionary. In bibliographic citations the transcriptions ordinarily reflect a standardized Yiddish orthography, regardless of any deviant (e.g. archaic) spelling of the original. When philological accuracy is at stake, other transcription systems are used. Capitalizations Although Yiddish does not possess capital letters, their use is recommended in transcription of the first letter of: (a) first, middle, and last names; (b) toponyms ( in case of a multiple name, only the first component: Rio-de-zhaneyro); (c) names of organizations and institutions (only the first component of a multiple name, e.g. Yidisher visnshaftlekher institute); (d) the first word after a period; (e) the first word in the name of a periodical or in the title of a book, play, or film e.g., Der yiddisher poyps (not: “Der Yidisher Poyps”, Di Tsukunft, Grine Felder). Proper names The following rule applies to personal names of leading figures of Yiddish literature and of Ashkenazic Jewry in general: if the name occurs in the Yiddish text, it is transcribed on the same phonemic basis as all other words and is capitalized as noted in the preceding paragraph, e.g., Maks Vaynraykh iz geven a groyser gelernter or Nokh aza humorist vi Sholem-Aleyhkhem iz shver tsu gefinen. If the name occurs in the English text and does have a generally accepted Romanized spelling, the accepted Romanized spelling is used: “Max Weinreich was a great scholar” or “It is not easy to find another Sholem Aleichem.”
אַ	A
אָ	O
בּ	B
ב	V
ג	G
ד	D
ה	H
וּ,ו	U
וו	V
וי	OY
ז	Z
זש	ZH
ח	KH
ט	T
טש	TSH
ִי	(SYLLABIC) I (NON-SYLLABIC) y
י	I
יי	EY
יַיַ	AY
כּ	K
כ,ך	KH
ל	L
מ,ם	M
נ,ן	N
ס	S
ע	E
פּ	P
פ,ף	F
צ,ץ	TS
ק	K
ר	R
ש	SH
שׂ	S
תּ	T
ת	S