Inline citation showing author's full name (Chicago)

Using MS Word 2013, with the doc preferences set to Chicago author-date, I am seeing something that I don't understand. Is it a Zotero anomaly or a correct implementation of some obscure Chicago rule?

When I insert a reference to a book by Rene Girard, the inline citation says "(Girard 1996)". That's what I expect. But when I add a reference to a second book by the same author, *both* references then use the author's full name, like this ...

===================
(René Girard 1996)(René Girard 1989)

Bibliography

Girard, René. 1989. The Scapegoat. Johns Hopkins paperbacks ed. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
———. 1996. The Girard Reader. Edited by James G. Williams. New York: Crossroad.
===================

I have tried various combinations with four different books by the same author. It always seems to be the 1989 book listed above that causes this behaviour. But why would an inline citation *ever* show the author's full name rather than just surname?

--Matt.
  • Try just inputting the author's name again for the 1989 book.
    But why would an inline citation *ever* show the author's full name rather than just surname?
    If you had works by Rene Girard and Susan Girard, the inline citations would be (R. Girard 1989)(S. Girard 2000). For Richard Girard and Rene Girard you get (Rene Girard 1989)(Richard Girard 2001). That's what the Chicago manual prescribes and it make sense to make sure readers know who you're talking about.

    What I _think_ is going on in your case is that there's some odd difference (likely the composition of the egu e) between the two works that the disambiguation routine picks up on, treating the two Girards as different authors.
  • Ain't this internet thing wonderful?!!!

    A totally accurate answer within 5 minutes. Thank you Adam.

    I copy-pasted "René" in all the Zotero items so that they would all be identical. When I refreshed the Word doc the citations are all back to "(Girard nnnn)".
  • edited August 15, 2015
    In case it's useful for testing, here is a handy site for converting strings between the four Unicode composition schemes:

    http://minaret.info/test/normalize.msp

    I tried entering items for René Girard with the two possible forms for the é glyph, but disambiguation sees the two as identical - but then maybe strings are now being normalized when they enter the Zotero database (I don't remember what the score is there).
  • but then maybe strings are now being normalized when enter the Zotero database
    yup: https://github.com/zotero/zotero/pull/585
  • I'm having the same problem that MatthewClarke described, but adamsmith's solution didn't work for me. Inline I'm getting (Rudolf P. Gaudio 1998), even though there is no other Gaudio in my database.

    In addition, in the "works cited" list, the bibliography is not sorting by date.

    Instead it looks like this:

    Gaudio, Rudolf P. 2008. “Out on Video: Gender, Language and New Public Spheres in Islamic Northern Nigeria.” In Words, Worlds, and Material Girls: Language, Gender, Globalization, edited by Bonnie S. McElhinny, 237–86. Walter de Gruyter.

    ———. 2009. Allah Made Us: Sexual Outlaws in an Islamic African City. Chichester U.K. & Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell.

    ———. 1997. “Not Talking Straight in Hausa.” In Queerly Phrased: Language, Gender, and Sexuality, edited by Anna Livia and Kira Hall, 115–28.
  • Could you see if this happens with just two of those citations?
    Try out all three combinations, see if you get the disambiguation for all of them.

    If you're able to reproduce this with just two, export those two to Zotero RDF (otherwise all three), open with a text editor (notepad, TextEdit, select all and copy&paste to gist.github.com (no registration necessary), create public gist and post the URL here.
  • Opened the doc on a different computer, refreshed zotero and the inline citations were fixed. So I'll try again on the original computer tomorrow and if necessary post what you asked for.
  • Please note the Zotero versions on both computers in case this does end up being a bug that'll be helpful in tracking it down (or in ascertaining that it's already fixed).
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