How many spaces you use after a period is a style choice. The 2019 edition of the associated press stylebook and briefing on media law includes more than 200 new or revised entries, with chapters covering data journalism, business, fashion, food, religion and sports terms, as well as media law, news values, punctuation, social media, polls and surveys and a new chapter on health and science. Jul 27, 2016 how many spaces should i leave after a period. Likewise, the new york public library writers guide to style and usage decrees. The associated press stylebook, first published in 1977, clarified the news organizations rules on grammar. Do not use abbreviations in your assignments for the adjutant general school unless you define them first. Jun 10, 2015 after my podcast explaining why we now put one space after a period at the end of a sentence, rebecca wrote in to ask how many spaces go after a colon just as with the period, it used to be common to put two spaces after a colon, but now most style guides that address the matter e. Published work these days rarely features two spaces after a period. See also ap style times, ap style time sequences, and is noon am or pm. In a voice dripping with superiority, i sent him a reply that said i was following the rule for proper spacing after a period, which is to put two spaces, thank you very much. I saw someone sharing a post recently stating that you now support two spaces after a period, falling in line with ap style.
Version 174 march 22, 2017 page 1 navy editors and writers should follow the most recent edition of the associated press stylebook except. Associated press style is to use dashes, not bullets, for lists that follow a colon. Honore daumier, sancho panza and don quixote in the mountains, 1866 or 1868 wikiart. Endorsing wynns viewpoint, megan mcardle at the atlantic concisely stated why most lawyers continue to be twospacers. After all, the associated press stylebook recommends one space. May 08, 2015 the modern and easytofollow style is to put one space after a period. Proper way of representing twenty five dollars and fifty two cents. How to use ellipses for omissions within a quoted sentence. Colon capitalize the first word after a colon only if it is a proper noun or the start of a complete sentence. Sentence spacing guidance is provided in many language and style guides. Early american, english, and other european typesetters style guides also known as printers rules specified spacing standards that were all essentially identical from the 18th century onwards.
But on that day, i decided to use my small platform to vent about how many spaces one should put after a period. Although it renders all its examples with just one space, and it states that most publishers guidelines advise one space, it adds that there is nothing wrong with using two spaces after concluding punctuation marks unless an instructor asks you to do otherwise. Well, while youre investigating the issue, please be advised that this omission has made my work more difficult, as now i have to squint through as much as a 30page document to be sure that there is only one space between sentences. In military ranks, spell out the figure when it is used after the name or without a name. When and why did we suddenly stop putting 2 spaces after a. Actually academia and law style books dont require two spaces. The asterisk used to be used to omit letters, and theres at least one place where that practice survives. Mar 27, 20 two spaces after a period is dead and has been for as long as ive been in publishing. See the mlas formatting guidelines for more information. So does the chicago manual of style and writers digest. Historical style guides before the 20th century typically indicated that wider spaces were. If your document has two spaces, they have to go in and remove the extra spaces. The department prefers bullets, but punctuate them per ap style. Dec 30, 20 about six years ago, an editor at ragan sent me an email asking me to stop using two spaces after my periods when submitting my columns to the ragan report.
Mar 24, 2020 the article begins by noting that apa style requires two spaces after a period in manuscripts, but that ruling was reversed for the seventh edition of the apa manual, published in late 2019. May 04, 2018 in the beginning, the rules of the space bar were simple. Associated press stylebook use a single space after a period at the end of a sentence. Nothing says over 40 like two spaces after a period. Mechanics of style chapter 6 in terms of mechanics, the seventh edition of the apa publication manual contains a variety of minor changes from the sixth edition. You can setup your grammar check to alert you when you have failed to place two spaces after a period. The new edition of the publication manual recommends that authors include two spaces after each period in draft manuscripts. When using a monospaced font, where everything is the same width, it makes sense to type two spaces after a period at the.
Writing center quick reference associate press style guide. To subscribe to the associated press stylebook online, or to find out about purchasing hard copies. It is the indispensable reference for writers, editors, proofreaders, indexers, copywriters, designers, and publishers, informing the editorial canon with sound, definitive advice. Some grammarians even get snarky about it, saying nothing says over 40 like two spaces after a period.
The two spaces after period rule was established during the days of typesetters, when additional space was needed to show the difference between the spacing between words which was smaller and the spacing between sentences which was larger. If no usage is specified, spell out numbers below 10 and use figures for numbers 10 and above. That means every character takes up the same amount of space. One space between sentences, please chicago tribune. Why microsoft word now considers two spaces after a period an. The bible for journalistic style, the associated press stylebook, says. The chicago manual of style, the us government printing of. Generally ap style omits periods in acronyms, unless doing so would spell an unrelated word. Microsoft word will now mark two spaces after a period as. Style manual, and the ap stylebook are just a few of the style guides that.
Among their rules was that we should use one space after a period instead of two so thats how we should do it. Spacing after periods, colons, question marks, and exclamation marks. In the skidmore study, among people who write with two spaces after periods twospacersthere was an increase in reading speed of 3 percent when reading text with two spaces following periods, as. The dash, semicolon, question mark and exclamation point go. The new american psychological association style guidelines came out recently, and they. Illustration by tara haelle the nation was rocked this week by a paradigmshattering study.
In defense of space the extra one after a period above. Originally, typewriters had monospaced fonts skinny letters and fat letters took up the same amount of space, so two spaces after ending punctuation marks such as the period were used to make the text more legible. For example, you could leave the first letter but use asterisks to replace the missing letters. Ap itself along with gi and eu are exceptions to this rule. While there are some circumstances where it is proper to use two spaces after a sentence, it is rarely actually incorrect to use just one. May 09, 2018 the nation was rocked this week by a paradigmshattering study. The ap stylebook has a few simple rules for using quotation marks in ap style stories. Jun 25, 2019 lawyers who like to get worked up over unimportant issues often grow contentious in their opinions over whether to put one space or two spaces after the period in legal documents. The shift to one space after a period the story of spaces after periods is often told as though monospaced typewriter fonts needed two spaces after a sentence. Another partner and i got into the whole periodspace versus periodspacespace controversy a couple years ago. According to most stylebooks, such as the associated press stylebook and the chicago manual of style, you always use a single space after a sentence. There are no abbreviations in addresses unless specifically stated in the.
Publications in the united states today usually have the same spacing after concluding punctuation marks as between words on the same line. This blog is about teaching, and i rarely stray from that focus. Some like the hip look of the single space after a period. The problem is that most style guides, such as the chicago manual of style, ap stylebook, and the mla style manual require the widelyaccepted approach of one. And also, as an editor, for the love of god, please do not doublespace after periods, if your work is going to be used by anyone else for anything its admittedly not terribly difficult to do a findreplace of a doublespace to convert it to a single space which i have to do regularly since around a third of the people who submit stuff to me still doublespace but it. Apply the same punctuation sequence when the grammar preceding an ellipsis calls for a question mark, exclamation point, comma.
Then, sometime, somewhere, someone decided that to increase the readability of words and to ensure we could pack more of them in, we should only single space after the period at. After each bullet, capitalize the first letter and use periods at the end of each item. A period piece by jay shepherd my overlords here at atl thought it would be fun to run a poll about whether there should be one space or two after a period. In an earlier era, writers using a typewriter commonly left two spaces after a period, a question mark, or an exclamation point. The associated press stylebook, the standard in newspaper and magazine publishing, doesnt even bother addressing the wellworn issue in its print edition. Mla and chicago manual of style, as well as ap, use one space. Use decimals up to two places for amounts in the millions and.
I grabbed my copy of the associated press stylebook, the bible of sorts for. To show line breaks when quoting poetry in running text, use a slash between the lines, with a space before and after the slashes. On its online ask the editor page, ap has answered the question with a simple, ap always uses one space after a period. Science has definitively found that two spaces after a period in typed text provides the most efficient reading experience for readers. Use a single space after the period at the end of a sentence. What follows are summaries of some of the most common style rules. The chicago manual of style online is the venerable, timetested guide to style, usage, and grammar in an accessible online format. The other eight were fairly neutral, and one actually required both styles in different scenarios. While he didnt like it, he agreed and periodspace became the rule of. Learn vocabulary, terms, and more with flashcards, games, and other study tools.
Period use only one space after the end of a sentence. Microsoft word 2010 and later editions does not allow the user to put in two spaces after a period in any automatic way. Please stop inserting two spaces in between sentences. The majority of style guides that use a latinderived alphabet as a language base now prescribe or recommend the use of a single space after the concluding punctuation of a sentence. Mar 21, 2017 there are better reasons to embrace the extra space after a period, but these are my reasons. There are 2 different opinions about how many spaces go after a period. Doublespacing after a period and why you should not do it. According to the ap stylebook, which is used by most journalistic publications and by bka for our seo content, you should treat an ellipsis as a threeletter word consisting of three periods with no spaces in between. About six years ago, an editor at ragan sent me an email asking me to stop using two spaces after my periods when submitting my columns to the ragan report.
We still cant decide whether to put one space after a period. Chicago manual of style spaces after period rutrackerenergy. The oldest type sample i have on hand is a replica of an american short story set in williamsburg, virginia, in 1774. Jan 12, 2011 among their rules was that we should use one space after a period instead of twoso thats how we should do it.
Quotation marks single quotation marks should be used only for a quote within a quote. This is not just ap standard practice but also a pet peeve of journalists and editors all across the english. Also, page designers encourage people to use one space. The story of spaces after periods is often told as though monospaced typewriter fonts needed two spaces after a sentence for good readability, and that the wide availability of proportional fonts. And when quoting more than one stanza in running text, insert two slashes between the stanzas. Do not use periods in abbreviations that are in headlines, unless they are needed for clarity. It indicates that users could continue the use of two spaces if using a. Use a single space after a period at the end of a sentence.
You can read more about it in the apa style handbook on pages 8788. All five dictate the use of just one space a sixth reference, the mla handbook for writers of research papers, waffles. Absolute consistency is easy to monitor when double spaces are never allowed, but less easy when some spaces after periods are double and others single such as those at the ends of abbreviations and initialisms in running text. Shortly after the invention of movable type, highly variable spacing was created that could create spaces of any size, and allowed for perfectly even justification. Science has definitively found that two spaces after a period in typed text. In typeset matter, one space, not two in other words, a regular word space, follows any mark of punctuation that ends a sentence, whether a period, a colon, a question mark, an exclamation point, or closing quotation marks.
Spaces should only be inserted before or after the ellipsis as necessary to separate it. The story of spaces after periods is often told as though monospaced typewriter fonts needed two spaces after a sentence for good readability, and that the wide availability of proportional fonts on computers led to the switch to one space. These days, depending on what youre reading, you can find either one or two spaces between the end of one sentence and the beginning of another. Letters of uniform width looked cramped without extra space. On the other hand, five teachers favored one space after a period, mostly because two spaces looks dated. Some prefer two spaces and some prefer one space after a period. Whichever spacing you choose, be sure to use it consistently throughout your paper. The associated press stylebook because it is increasingly common for papers and manuscripts to be prepared with a single space after all punctuation marks, this spacing is shown in the examples in the mla handbook and the mla style manual. So began former slate writer farhad manjoos infamous 2011 tirade. The associated press stylebook provides an az guide to issues such as capitalization, abbreviation, punctuation, spelling, numerals and many other questions of language usage. Yes, its not that hard to do it with searchandreplace, but its not that hard to put dishes in the dishwasher.
Use one space after a period at the end of a sentence unless an instructor or publisher dictates otherwise. Its why i thought, for a long time, that i didnt like books. Two spaces after a period may be better than one the. Were you taught to put two spaces after a period at the end of a. There was a time when every period, question mark, or exclamation point was followed by two spaces.
Typesetters write and beg me to tell people to only use one space. Sentence spacing in language and style guides wikipedia. She smiled, youll want to read this gatehouse newsroom post about how to properly use quotation marks in ap style stories then. The period and the comma always go within the quotation marks. If the ellipsis follows a grammatically complete sentence, place a period after the last word preceding the ellipsis, and insert a space between this period and the ellipsis.
Apr 27, 2020 some maintain that two spaces between sentences make paragraphs easier to read. Aug 12, 2014 actually academia and law style books dont require two spaces. The veterinarian said, there is minimal chance of a. Editorial raphics and plishin serices is it one space or. There are two spaces after a colon, a period, and after the state and before the zip code in an address. The chicago manual of style chicago style and the modern language associations mla handbook mla style recommend using a space before and after equally spaced ellipses.
The complete manual on typography 2003 states that the typewriter tradition of separating sentences with twoword spaces after a period has no place in typesetting and the single space is standard typographic practice. A single character space, not two spaces, should be left after periods at the ends of sentences both in manuscript and in final, published form in typeset matter, one space, not two in other words, a regular word space, follows any mark of punctuation that ends a sentence, whether a period, a colon, a question mark, an exclamation point, or. Typing two spaces after a period is totally, completely, utterly, and inarguably wrong. Ap style also aims to avoid stereotypes and unintentionally offensive language. Curiously, the oldest stylebook i have, the 1995 edition. It states, in text, use only a single word space after all sentence punctuation. Most of my posts take days or weeks to research, draft, illustrate, and revise, but this one took less than two hours. Use hyphens for ages expressed as adjectives before a noun or as substitutes for a noun.
When typing on a typewriter, each character took up the same amount of space on the page. In its most recent version, the sixth edition 2010, the apa manual recommends two spaces between sentences for draft manuscripts. Two spaces after a period the old way most typewriter fonts are what are called monospaced fonts. Why you should never add two spaces after a period. But introducing two spaces after a sentenceending periodand only after those periodscauses problems. All highend frontend typesetting systems automatically truncate two spaces to one space but ms word does not and if you put two spaces after a period youll end up with four spaces in justified type. How to use ellipses according to ap style bka content. Aug 24, 2009 that book, though a dutch theological bibliography uses em spaces which are more or less equivalent to two word spaces after periods. How many spaces to type after a period plus 1 easy way to eliminate excess spaces click to tweet. The chicago manual of style 1, the ap stylebook 2, and the modern language association 3 all recommend using one space after a period at the end of a sentence.
May 11, 2018 in the skidmore study, among people who write with two spaces after periodstwospacersthere was an increase in reading speed of 3 percent when reading text with two spaces following. After some heated debate yelling in the hallway, i went and sourced it for him. More directly to the issue, miller said that the two spaces after a period have a mathematical beauty that makes it easier to read. Debate about two spaces after a period in legal writing. Oct 31, 2016 chicago manual of style double space after period typing two spaces after a period is totally, completely, utterly, and the chicago manual of style. While he didnt like it, he agreed and periodspace became the rule of grammar in our firms marketing materials see oh, brother. Leave one space after a period or other concluding punctuation mark, unless your instructor prefers two spaces. Bluebook, the legal style manual, doesnt have a rule on space after periods, but defers to the chicago manual one space. Three ellipses indicate that text has been omitted within a quoted sentence. Spiralbound book, updated each spring 2019 ap stylebook.
Some think the double space looks messy because it leaves. The latest editions of the associated press style book, the chicago manual of style. The content of newspapers and other mass media is typically the result of many different writers and editors working together. How to use an asterisk grammar girl quick and dirty tips. Apa style is widely used in the social sciences and humanities, and the apa style book has actually gone back and forth on the issue.
Ap style does use periods in most two letter abbreviations. Many lawyers are sharply divided on this issue, with opinions often breaking along generational lines based on when the lawyer originally learned how to type. Two spaces after a period grammar girl quick and dirty tips. And while strunk and white have remained silent on the topic, you can see that they use the single space in. In the era when type was set by hand, it was common to use extra space sometimes quite a bit of it after periods, a practice that continued into the first half of the twentieth century. Besides, the argument in favor of two spaces isnt any less arbitrary. The first printing of the declaration of independence used two spaces after its periods, while most bibles from around the same time stuck to a onespace standard. The asterisk goes before the dash, but after every other punctuation mark. Science has definitively found that two spaces after a period in typed text provides the most efficient. Lawyers are sharply divided on spacing between sentences when writing a paper. The double space rule went out with the typewriterand theres a logical reason for that. Anyway, i already made my only point when i said refer to the associated press stylebook. May 02, 2018 people began inserting two spaces after the period during the era of the typewriter.
832 104 47 957 1131 1332 302 851 434 530 337 144 271 195 833 201 560 1139 472 959 1291 1092 973 519 155 424 916 238 1355 1047 856 1419 1362 34 1665 911 407 1271 1159 463 784 844 1326