Formatting errors: in-text citations for Chicago author-date

sovink

Using Zotero Standalone with Word 2011 for the Mac and the updated version of Chicago Manual of Style 16th edition author-date, the in-text parenthetical citations are not formatting correctly. Two problems keep emerging:

1. In-text citations are not automatically alphabetized. For example, if I edit a string of citations (Abel 2008; Zenith 2006) to add O'Neil 2007, it adds O'Neil to the END of the string, rather than inserting it between Abel and Zenith.

2. In-text citations sometimes include an author's first name, seemingly at random. Here is an actual example from my document that shows both problems at once: (Gary Reich and Barth 2012; Russell 2007; Sponsler 2011; e.g. Abrego 2008). I checked the citation as it appears in Zotero Standalone, and "Gary" is definitely not listed in the Lastname field.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Manually fixing all the citations is very time-consuming! Thanks in advance.

adamsmith

1. We might want to pick something here, but note that the manual doesn't actually provide much guidance:

Two or more references in a single parenthetical citation are separated by semicolons. The order in which they are given may depend on what is being cited, and in what order, or it may reflect the relative importance of the items cited. If neither criterion applies, alphabetical or chronological order may be appropriate. Unless the order is prescribed by a particular journal style, the decision is the author’s.

so whatever we do, it's going to be wrong for someone. (edit-- currently they just appear in the order you enter them. You can easily switch the order in the classic view of the Word add-on, which you can use by clicking on the small arrow on the left of the insert citation toolbar)

2. You're seeing http://www.zotero.org/support/kb/given_name_disambiguation Likely you have a G. Reich as a first author in a reference so Zotero disambiguates with the full first name.

sovink

Thanks adamsmith. This solves problem #2.

As for problem #1, is there a way for me to edit the CSL so that for me, the order shows up automatically in ABC order, rather than manually editing all the strings of citations?

adamsmith

sure.
find
<citation et-al-min="4" et-al-use-first="1" disambiguate-add-year-suffix="true" disambiguate-add-names="true" disambiguate-add-givenname="true" givenname-disambiguation-rule="primary-name">
<layout prefix="(" suffix=")" delimiter="; ">

and insert four lines so that it reads

<citation et-al-min="4" et-al-use-first="1" disambiguate-add-year-suffix="true" disambiguate-add-names="true" disambiguate-add-givenname="true" givenname-disambiguation-rule="primary-name">
<sort>
<key macro="contributors-short"/>
<key macro="date"/>
</sort>
<layout prefix="(" suffix=")" delimiter="; ">

General instructions here:
http://www.zotero.org/support/dev/citation_styles/style_editing_step-by-step (especially important in your case to edit the style's id and title)

sovink

Thanks! Problem solved. :)