► Writing good titles is extremely important - always think like a researcher - what is in the folder, volume, or document that they need to know. A date, whenever possible is a great enhancement. If it is truly undated, use “undated” as the date expression.
► This is often how researchers will decide if a collection contains information that makes research worth their time, and sometimes travel, to access it.
► Pay attention to your wording and be as accurate as possible.
Example: Meeting regarding potato farming in Hastings, Florida, 1995. Is this a meeting about potatoes farmed in Hastings, Florida, or is it a meeting about potato farming, generally, which was held in Hastings, Florida? A researcher may be interested in only one of these topics and an unclear title such as this one may be misleading, resulting in a researcher wasting time or missing useful information altogether.
Try not to use abbreviations - few are absolutely standardized and it is best to avoid possible ambiguities.
Common words and abbreviations you may not think about:
► memo = memorandum (plural: memoranda)
► info = information
► misc = miscellaneous (try to avoid this word unless the rest of your title or series is more descriptive)
► & = and (except for instances where the ampersand is part of a business name or similar, such as AT&T, Florida A&M University)
► # = number
► etc. = et cetera (try to avoid this too)
Exceptions:
► St., Jr., and Ft. and similar in city and person names
► U.S. (United States) and D.C. (Washington, D.C.) (note the use of periods in these); Please write out state names if possible.
► Degrees: B.A., M.A., Ph.D. (note the use of periods in these)
Acronyms: Do not use acronyms without describing them fully the first time they are used.
► Use acronyms sparingly: With electronic finding aids, researchers may jump to a portion of the finding aid without reading all of the notes. If you have a series title that has an acronym, make certain that you include the full name in the series title, in addition to the acronym. Example: Florida Economic Development Council (FEDC)
► If using an acronym and pluralizing it, make it a small ‘s’ and don’t use an apostrophe. (e.g., PACs, EISs, EAs)
Inclusive Dates:
► 1849-1851 (no spaces around the dash)
► NOT 1849-51
If the collection continues to accrue, place the most recent accrual in the date span:
► 1965-2009
► NOT 1965- OR 1965- (Ongoing)
Bulk Dates:
► 1895-1960, bulk 1916-1958 (When entering this data in the Excel sheet, there are separate cells for inclusive and bulk dates.)
Significant Gap in Records:
► 1827, 1952-1978
Estimated Date Ranges:
► approximately 1952-1978 OR circa 1870-1879
Single Dates:
► 1975
► 1975 March
► 1975 March 17
Estimated Dates:
► circa 1967
► before 1967
► after 1967 January 5
► 1960s
No Dates:
► undated
(These notes pertain to typing information into an Excel sheet or ArchivesSpace)
Punctuation:
► Do not put punctuation at the end of your collection, series, subseries, or folder titles.
► Do not add unnecessary spaces after the folder titles or dates as this can cause additional spaces when entries are merged through a style sheet.
► Hyphens: Use a space on either side of a hyphen when used to separate ideas; do NOT use spaces in hyphenated words or time/date spans.
► Do not put extra spaces within parentheses (for example) ( not like this ), or before a colon (Like: this; Not : this)
Formatting:
You can add formatting to your notes and series/folder titles, but it is not a quick and easy process. Therefore, whenever possible, make formatting decisions during the data entry process rather than waiting for the end.
► Italicize the titles of published and significant works in the notes and the series/folder titles. When writing titles on folders, underline the words that should be italicized in the final version. When entering data, surround italicized words as such: <title render="italic">Title Name Here</title>
► For smaller works, such as essays or journal articles, surround the title in quotation marks: “Title Name Here”
► Elements that are bolded are generally handled through the style sheet (such as Section or Series titles), but should you find the need to bold text within a note or folder title, it is similar to the italics coding: <emph render="bold">Bold text here</emph>
► Capitalization: Use sentence structure – capitalize the first word and proper titles or names. DO NOT capitalize every word. Do capitalize the word directly after a colon (:).
► Initials: Put a space after each period in a name (J. R. R. Tolkien). For places, do not use a space (U.S., D.C.).
► Possessive case: If a word is singular, but ends in ‘s’, you still need to add ’s in the possessive case (e.g., Lawton Chiles’s notebooks).
► Commas: Please use the Oxford comma (comma used before the conjunction, e.g., one, two, and three) as it helps clarify your intention.
► Pluralization: An apostrophe is not used to pluralize a noun, date, or acronym (e.g., EAs, 1980s) and in cases of doubt (e.g., thank yous), please use a different phrase (e.g., thank you notes, thank you letters)
► Miscellaneous: Avoid the use of "Miscellaneous" whenever possible. It doesn't really add anything to a description. If you absolutely must use the term in a series or folder title, please write a description that includes at least a list of the types of materials included therein (e.g., Miscellaneous financial materials).
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