BUG?: CMS 18, newspaper article — section out of order

marygauxlightly

Zotero v. 7.0.29
CMS 18

Greetings,

I am experiencing an issue with CMS 18, item type: Newspaper Article, which I think may be a bug.

When I generate a full note for a newspaper article, the section number precedes the title of the newspaper (see figs. 1–2):

“La exposición de Frida Kahlo […],” sec. 2, Novedades (Mexico City), April 15, 1953, 1.

I may be missing something, but I think the section and page numbers should both follow the date of the article:

“La exposición de Frida Kahlo […],” Novedades (Mexico City), April 15, 1953, sec. 2, p. 1.

Best,

M


FIG. 1:

https://s3.amazonaws.com/zotero.org/images/forums/u2440739/ts6khtovvdsxsqzzi770.png

FIG. 2:

https://s3.amazonaws.com/zotero.org/images/forums/u2440739/eeis2gi5plm54e3nppn4.png

dunning

The Section field is for the name of a department or column (e.g. Opinion) rather than a location.

Cf. https://forums.zotero.org/discussion/comment/499246#Comment_499246

marygauxlightly

@dunning my apologies. I completely forgot that I posted about this already. Was the Section field always for the name of a department or column? I may be imagining things, but I seem to recall a time when the Section field of the item type Newspaper Article designated the newspaper section in which an article was located.

On another note, I do notice with the Section field that sentence case doesn't work. Regardless of the language setting, all words are capitalized.

dunning

Yes, it looks as if the 16th edition of the Chicago styles handle the section field as part of the locator for newspapers, but this is a misinterpretation of the CSL specification, which specifically indicates that 'section' is to be used for a name such as 'politics':

https://docs.citationstyles.org/en/stable/specification.html#number-variables

marygauxlightly

@dunning Well that explains it.

I see the "Section" field is ideal for citing newspaper supplements. The only issue is that sentence casing doesn't work. Regardless of the language setting, all words are capitalized:

Moreno Villa, José. “La realidad y el deseo en Frida Kahlo.” In "México En La Cultura.” Supplement. Novedades, April 26, 1953. https://icaa.mfah.org/s/en/item/753110.

dunning

That's a bug in Zotero's citation processor. I've proposed a fix, but it will probably take a few months before this makes it in.

You can obtain the citation you've shown above by placing an issue/supplement name in the Extra field, in a form such as volume-title: México en la cultura.

A volume-title will add the text 'special issue' to a citation of a journal article, magazine, or newspaper unless you also add a supplement number such as supplement-number: 1. Chicago doesn't display volume or issue numbers for newspapers, so in this case it doesn't matter what you put. You can see the whole citation encoded here:

https://www.zotero.org/groups/2205533/items/47KXDRB7

marygauxlightly

@dunning I had no idea these fields existed! They will definitely help resolve some of the headaches I have experienced citing articles in supplements and special issues. Thank you so much for taking the time to point them out.

I wonder if there are other fields to which I am oblivious that might prove useful... Is there a webpage that reviews them? I can't find "volume-title" or "supplement-number" here: https://www.zotero.org/support/kb/item_types_and_fields.

marygauxlightly

@dunning The Volume-Title/Supplement-Number[1] solution works like a dream until I generate a bibliographical entry for an unsigned news article:

Novedades. “El legado de Diego Rivera al pueblo de México, un ejemplo digno de ser imitado.” In “México en la Cultura.” December 8, 1958.

Now granted, CMS 18 does not provide an example as niche as an unsigned news article in a newspaper supplement, but if I had to hazard a guess, maybe it should look something like this?

"México en la Cultura." Supplement, Novedades. “El legado de Diego Rivera al pueblo de México: un ejemplo digno de ser imitado.” December 8, 1958.


–M

[1] Random q: is there a special html tag you use so that text (e.g. "volume-title") is formatted with a grey box?

dunning

@marygauxlightly I'm glad that's at least partially working. What if we simply disable the title substitution mechanism if there is an issue title?

See the list of variables in the CSL Specification for everything you can insert into the Extra field.

The HTML tags allowed in citations are listed here:

https://www.zotero.org/support/kb/rich_text_bibliography

I'm having difficulty visualizing what you are looking to produce, but you might find something useful in the Unicode box-drawing characters.

enozkan

@marygauxlightly

[1] Random q: is there a special html tag you use so that text (e.g. "volume-title") is formatted with a grey box?

If you meant how to do this in the forums, just place whatever text between <code> and </code> tags to achieve whatever

dunning

@enozkan Thank you for answering that; I shouldn't answer forum posts before my morning coffee …

@marygauxlightly I've added a fix for the substitution problem to my current Chicago bug-fix proposal:

https://github.com/citation-style-language/styles/pull/7811

I have absolutely no idea how long it will take for this to become available.

I need to think a bit more about the circumstances in which one would have a special issue or supplement of a newspaper; I wonder whether it would be better to display 'supplement' as the default unless an edition is specified?

marygauxlightly

@enozkan Thanks for pointing this out. :)

marygauxlightly

@dunning I'm not sure what you mean by "title substitution mechanism" (likely due to my lack of coding savvy) here:

@marygauxlightly I'm glad that's at least partially working. What if we simply disable the title substitution mechanism if there is an issue title?

To ensure we our on the same page, I will take a moment to do a better job of explaining the issue I identified yesterday.[1] I confine my examples to bibliographic entries. I begin with a brief review of the relevant rules.

The Rules.

The basic citation format for news and magazine articles is (14.87, 89):

Signed Article:
Author. "Title." Publication, Date. [Edition].

Unsigned Article:
Publication. "Title." Date. [Edition].

CMS only features recommendations for articles in journal special issues and supplements (14.77–78).[2] Unlike a special issue, a journal supplement is numbered separately from the regular issues of its parent publication, but is formatted identically:

Author. "Title." In "Supplement," edited by Editor. Supplement, Publication Volume, no. Issue (Year): Pages. URL.

In the absence of guidelines, and in light of CMS 14.87 and 89, we are left to assume that the rules governing the citation of articles in special issues or supplements of journals may be selectively applied to those of magazines and newspapers.

Signed Article:
Author. “Title.” In “Supplement.” Supplement, Publication, Date.

Unsigned Article:
“Supplement.” Supplement, Publication. “Title.” Date.

Citing Articles in Special Issues or Supplements of Magazines or Newspapers with Zotero.

As mentioned in my previous reply, using the extra fields volume-title and supplement-number, the elements comprising a citation of a signed article appear in the correct order:

Henestrosa, Andrés. “Alacena de minucias.” In “Revista Mexicana de Cultura.” Supplement, El Nacional, April 26, 1953.

We run into an issue with an unsigned article:

Novedades. “El legado de Diego Rivera al pueblo de México: un ejemplo digno de ser imitado.” In “México en la Cultura.” December 8, 1958.

As you can see, the article is listed by the parent publication (Novedades), not the supplement (“México en la Cultura”). We are also missing the word "Supplement." Without any specific recommendations from CMS, I assume the citation should read as follows:

”México en la Cultura.” Supplement, Novedades. “El legado de Diego Rivera al pueblo de México: un ejemplo digno de ser imitado.” December 8, 1958.

It is difficult to get answers from CMS on somewhat niche issues such as this. Questions can be submitted to their Style Q & A. Understandably, only a handful are selected each month to be answered. My questions (including on how to cite articles in newspaper supplements) have gone unanswered, but it’s been several years since I submitted a question. Perhaps I will have better luck next time around.

–M


Notes.

[1] As an aside, I do hope that pointing out this and other issues is actually constructive and not a source of annoyance. 😅

[2] In my humble opinion, CMS does not provide sufficient examples and guidance for the citation of certain materials. I also think their recommendations to omit key locating information in bibliographical entries—page numbers for chapters in books, and volume, section, page, and/or issue numbers for newspaper or magazine articles—are misguided. Citations are for more than just crediting authors. They are meant to function much like addresses, enabling the reader to efficiently track down sources so that they may be consulted directly. The aforementioned datapoints are essential for requesting rare, out-of-print materials via services like interlibrary loan. One cannot reasonably expect library staff to go through an entire issue of a newspaper in search of an article, for example. And holdings of Mexican newspaper and magazine supplements in U.S. and Mexican repositories are typically listed in online catalogues by issue number (grouped by year), not by day-month-year of publication.