MHRA Edition 3 Reference Issues

Hi,

Using MHRA, Zotero does not follow the published style guide. So for instance: See the MHRA style guide in its manuscript section - Ch. 11.2.9. The repository always comes first, followed by the collection number, and then 'Document title', Zotero outputs references with the repository, collection number last. Is this correctable?

Secondly if a date is entered 10/6/1870 it will take this as m d y - US style.
However if you enter 13/6/1870 it automatically moves to UK style of d m y. Is there anyway to prevent the US style being used?

Cheers
  • 1.) We haven't fully implemented the archival source rules for MHRA -- partly because I don't fully understand them (that is the systematics behind them--I can read the manual, obviously), partly because it's very tedious. I can take another stab at it over the summer.

    2.) See here: https://forums.zotero.org/discussion/6797/zotero-appearance-how-do-i-change-date-format-in-date-added/#Item_39
    i.e. this depends on the locale installed (thread is on slightly different topic, but solution should apply to this as well).
  • Many thanks Adam - I agree with the tedious but Zotero is a great program!
  • Hey AdamSmith,

    Did you get a chance to look at this over the Summer? I'd be really happy to have a chat with you as a user of MHRA, if there are any issues I could help clarify.

    There are a few problems that I can see causing headaches:

    References to unbound leaves of paper are different from page numbers, but even if users had to do this manually themselves it would really help to implement something.

    The abbreviation of later references also seems to involve a subjective judgement that would be hard if not impossible to code. Again it would still be an improvement, if users had to do this themselves manually.

    But the basic structure of 'City, Archive, Title' should be relatively straightforward to implement. A new 'City' or 'Location of Archive' field would be required under the existing item type 'Documents' or a new 'Manuscript'. Is this sort of change feasible?

    All the best,

    eoin_o
  • edited September 7, 2015
    So, I have now added/changed two things in the style:
    1. The order of archival information is now displayed as
    archive-place, archive, archive_location
    archive-place doesn't have a corresponding field in Zotero, so you'll have to enter it either as part of the archive or, more robustly, as
    {:archive-place: London} into the "Extra" field.

    2. I've corrected the locator label for folio to fol./fols in line with MHRA.

    The main thing I don't really understand is the lack of title/author for these citations. I'm currently leaving them in, which is apparently wrong?
    But isn't it terribly confusing to not refer to an actual description of what you're citing in a citation? And depending on where you do your archival research, do we necessarily have individual folios numerated rather than just boxes?
    So how about authors, titles, dates?

    Currently, you can of course just have items without any of that information in Zotero and they'll cite correctly

    *Edited to specify where the archive-place workaround should be included.
  • Hi Adam Smith,

    Thank you! I, for one, really appreciate you having done this.

    I just have one further query. Are you suggesting that the most robust way to input the data for the British Library, for example, would use the following format in the 'archive' field:

    {archive-place: London} British Library

    Alternatively, where else should we input the {archive-place: London} part of the record, given that there is no field for this element?

    Thanks again,

    Eoin
  • Alternatively, where else should we input the {archive-place: London} part of the record, given that there is no field for this element?
    into the "Extra" field. Sorry, I somehow failed to include that rather crucial bit.
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