How to Refer

Writing to Tormod Kinnes and referring to a Gold Scales page, be sure to include the last parts of what is in the 'location address' atop the page(s) in question: what follows "oaks.nvg.org/" of the 'location address' of the page, will do.

A Much Preferred Way of Referring on the Gold Scales

A. TEXT ANNOTATIONS: In texts I refer to work titles by reference letters (initials of titles and acronyms), for it is short, simple and to the point. Thus, Aae 75 is simpler than "Berne 1971, 75". And "Cmg 22" is much simpler than "Lowenfeld and Brittain, 1982, p. 22".

Referring by code letters (acronyms for titles) or otherwise abridged titles may work very well for a defined corpus. The method is used for such as the books of the Bible. However, it is not an "either-or", but a "both-end" issue. One may use both referring ways, as may be appropriate and convenient. If you are writing something for a school or university, check what citation standards and style guide you may adhere to. The Chicago Manual of Style talks of two avenues of referring: One way is called the humanities style. The other way is the clearer and more succinct author-date documentation system, which is used in the sciences and is gaining adherents in the social sciences and humanities as too.

There are other style guides apart from the CMS. The APA style guide has many adherents too, and the MLA style guide has its users in the field of literature.

B. BIBLIOGRAPHY ENTRIES: On the site there is an extensive literature list of code letters, authors, works, and other necessary data. Entries conform for most part to the bibliography format of the humanities style of the Chicago Manual of Style (CMS) guidelines (16th edition, 2010), and Mary Ann Rampolla's A Pocket Guide to Writing History [Wrh], a slender book that draws on the CMS (15th ed.) and conforms to it.

Cite a document (work, "page") on the Gold Scales as your style guide would have it. In general you may be asked to cite a selection from a site like this, by starting with the last name of the author of the selection (if known) and separate the elements of the citation with periods. Hence:

Legge, James, tr. The Lun Yu. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1893. On-line version 2005, ed. Tormod Kinnes. oaks.nvg.org/sa3ra8.html

Unknown author, for example:

Rhymes and Jingles of the Complete Mother Goose. 2004. The Gold Scales. oaks.nvg.org/mother-goose.html

Aae: Berne, Eric. Transactional Analysis in Psychotherapy. New York: Grove, 1971.

Cmg: Lowenfeld, Viktor, and W. Lambert Brittain. Creative and Mental Growth. 7th ed. Macmillan, New York, 1982.

Csm: The University of Chicago Press. The Chicago Manual of Style. 16th ed. London: The University of Chicago Press, 2010.

Wrh: Rampolla, Mary Lynn. A Pocket Guide to Writing History. 4th ed. Boston: Bedford/St Martin's, 2004.