SOME GUIDELINES FOR WRITING AMERICAN HISTORY PAPERS

Prof. Margaret O’Mara

Some general pointers, especially for writing about U.S. political history:

STYLE

Avoid “twenty-dollar words.” Don’t put a word in a paper that you would never say in normal conversation. Make sure you understand the meaning of any word you are using in a paper. Use online versions of major dictionaries and thesauruses, like http://www.merriam-webster.com . Read a paper out loud to see whether sentences are complete, whether they run on too long, or whether better terminology can be used to express what you mean. Quantity does not always mean quality; I would rather see a paper come slightly under the page limit rather than have to read an extra half-page where little of substance is said. That being said, page counts are there for a reason; they indicate the length I consider necessary to properly explore the topic at hand. Spell check, grammar check, and then do both again. Don’t rely entirely on Microsoft Word to do your copy editing.

DOCUMENTATION

Footnotes, endnotes, parenthetical documentation should adhere to one of the widely accepted styles of citation (Chicago and MLA are the most appropriate for a history paper). The UW Library has a short Chicago style guide available online at http://www.lib.washington.edu/help/guides/45chicago.pdf . I strongly recommend that you purchase a style manual for use in all your paper-writing; many copies are in the library, but it is good to have your own on hand and used copies are widely available. Some basic rules:

• If you are writing a paper that relies mostly on class readings, you may use parenthetical documentation, for example:
• “Despite the systematic disenfranchisement of black voters after Reconstruction in the South, there remained some evidence of ‘the persisting vitality of black grassroots electoral activity’ (Hahn 410).”
• “The Cold War military-industrial complex helped determine where the modern high-tech industry grew in the United States (O’Mara).”
• If you are writing a research paper that brings in primary and secondary sources from within and outside of the course reading list, use footnotes:
• “As Lisa McGirr has shown, the housewives of Orange County became key players in the growing conservative movement as they rallied around Barry Goldwater’s candidacy for president.”[1]
• “’More fundamental correctives are needed to curb financiers’ appetite for walking a tightrope,’ the New York Times editorial page wrote, as the credit crisis of 2008 deepened.”[2]
• Always put a citation after the end of a direct quote or a statement about a particular author’s opinion or analysis. Otherwise, keep citations to the end of a paragraph. Avoid multiple uses of “ibid.” if possible; when citing one source repeatedly in a paragraph, place citation at the end.

CAPITALIZATION

• Capitalize when you are referring to a specific person or organization
• Democratic Party, Republican Party, Reform Party, Green Party
• Democratic nominee, Republican nominee
• President Harry S Truman, President George W. Bush
• Congress, Senate
• World War II
• Great Depression
• Don’t capitalize when you are referring to a general occupation or office, or a political modifier that does not refer to a particular party
• running for president
• presidential campaign
• democratic government (not government led by a Democrat, but a government run as a democracy)
• independent voter
• civil rights struggle; civil rights leader
• suburbanite
• the working class, working-class voter
• recession

ABBREVIATION

• On first mention, write out the entire name of an entity, followed by its common abbreviation in parentheses: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS); University of Washington (UW). Further mentions can just use the acronym: HHS, UW.
• Don’t refer to presidents by their initials, even if that is common colloquial usage. Franklin Roosevelt, or Roosevelt, not FDR. John Kennedy, or Kennedy, not JFK.

[1] McGirr, Suburban Warriors: The Rise of the American Right (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2001).

[2] “Socialized Compensation,” editorial, New York Times, 21 March 2008, p A28.