Manuscript Style Guidelines

Paper length
Papers should usually be no more than 20,000 words in length and should be submitted together with an abstract of 300-500 words. However the editors are flexible as there are fewer restrictions for digital publication. Book reviews should be no more than 5,000 words. If you think that there are special reasons for you to exceed this length please consult the editor.
 
General Instructions
OJBS: Online Journal of Bahá'í Studies has tried to follow the submission guidelines, with some modifications and extensions as laid down by the Bahá'í Studies Review.

Style and Content
The OJBS: Online Journal of Bahá'í Studies follows the latest edition (4th as at 2008) of Judith Butcher, Copy-editing: the Cambridge Handbook with a few modifications, for style. Please use the latest edition of the Concise Oxford Dictionary for spelling, except in the case of Arabic and Persian words (see Transliteration below); please use -ize ending for verbs rather than -ise; for example: italicize. Please use the Times Atlas of the World for geographical names, although Middle Eastern place-names may be given in their transliterated form (but without diacriticals, see Transliteration below).

Please provide an abstract of your paper of some 300-500 words. This should be placed at the beginning of your paper.
Please write dates as: 6 July 1884, 20th century
Do not use dots in abbreviations: USA US UK UNESCO Dr Mr Mrs
Where a surname is given with initials there should be dots, and space after the initials; for example: E. G. Browne
A standard ellipsis consists of three points – never four, as in: should be stops . . . as in
You may use Persia or Iran as you wish but the language is always Persian, not Farsi

Try to avoid all cultural bias (the tendency to use the practices of the West as the norms by which everything else should be judged); gender bias (the tendency to refer to the male as the norm; use of: ‘man’ and ‘mankind’ as well as the pronoun ‘he’ to refer to all of humanity); religious bias (the tendency to refer to religions other than the Bahá'í Faith as ‘past religions’ and to refer to them in the past tense). Please avoid jargon, generalities, banter, in-group jokes, esoteric allusions, unnecessary opinions, unattributed quotations, and digressions. If there is a serious difference of scholarly opinion on a subject, present all sides fairly. Do not make ad hominem attacks on other scholars, especially in book reviews. Criticize and comment on another’s work, not the person himself or herself. Use adjectives and adverbs sparingly and make every word count. When in doubt, define a term or identify a person.

Once you have submitted your paper, your work is considered final; please do not then send corrections and ‘addenda’. Remember to double-check the spelling of all proper nouns and to run the spell-check function of your word-processing program. Double check citations, URL's, quotations, dates and other facts; we will not necessarily check these.

Capitalization
The preferred style is to minimize capitalization. Please do not capitalize positions (eg president) or institutions (eg local spiritual assembly), unless as part of the name of a specific individual or institution (eg Local Spiritual Assembly of Kampala). Please only capitalization personal pronouns related to God, not holy persons. This avoids difficult distinctions such as whether pronouns related to Guru Nanak should be capitalized or not, when he is being referred to as a founder of Sikhism alongside the founders of other religions.

Transliteration and use of italics
The OJBS: Online Journal of Bahá'í Studies uses the Bahá'í system of transliteration The use of diacritical marks should, however, be kept to a minimum. Diacritical marks should only be used in transliterating sentences or technical phrases in Arabic or Persian and in the titles of works. The names of people, places and common words do not usually need diacritical marks. Thus for example words and names such as Baha’u’llah, ‘Abdu’l-Baha, Bahá'í, Muhammad, ‘ulama, and kitab need no diacritical marks. In cases where the author feels that confusion may arise or there is a need to specify pronunciation, transliteration should be used on the first occasion that the word occurs but not subsequently. Arabic phrases and names should be transliterated according to Arabic pronunciation. Names such as Aminu’s-Sultan may be broken up as Amin as-Sultan and Persian names and phrases such as Khátirát-i-Nuhsálih-yi-‘Akká should be broken up thus for clarity: Khátirát-i Nuhsálih-yi ‘Akká.

When quoting a passage from an Arabic or Persian text, diacriticals should be used but not italics. Italics should only be used for the titles of books, for emphasis and for foreign words and phrases, as indicated in the latest edition of the Concise Oxford Dictionary. Please give translations for all passages or expressions in foreign languages unless they appear in the Concise Oxford Dictionary.

Numbers
Spell out whole numbers one to ten, a hundred, a thousand, five thousand; but use figures for other numbers, percentages (6 per cent – note that ‘per cent’ is spelled out as two words), page numbers, and exact measurements (5 feet). If similar numbers both large and small occur in a single paragraph or section, use figures for all of them as in: The group consisted of 5 women and 17 men. Please note that ‘the 1930s’ does not have an apostrophe.

Quotation, Notes, References and Bibliography
Use single quotation marks for all quotations and double quotation marks for quotations within quotations. Quotations of less than four lines should go within the text in quotation marks. For longer quotations, break off from the main text, use an indented paragraph, and do not enclose in quotation marks. Lengthy quotations are discouraged and the author is responsible for obtaining permission for the use of any lengthy quotations.

The OJBS: Online Journal of Bahá'í Studies has footnotes using the short-title reference and bibliographic conventions from Judith Butcher, Copy-editing: the Cambridge Handbook, with some modifications. Give the full bibliographic details (see examples below) at the first mention of a work. Footnotes are numeric and at the foot of the page. Subsequently mentions should be in the short title form. Any frequently cited source can be abbreviated; for example: BW 11:245-56 – see below for the format for the first entry for this abbreviation. If the author’s name is given in the text, just the title and subsequent details can be given in the footnote. Do not use loc.cit., op.cit., etc. You may use ibid for references to a source cited in the immediately preceding note only, provide there is only one work cited in the previous note. Ibid is not used when it is the first footnote on a page, always start with a fresh short citation. It should be punctuated thus: ibid 95. With this system, no separate bibliography is needed. Long digressions in footnotes are discouraged.

The following are some examples of the full bibliographic details to be given at the first mention of a work followed by the same reference in short-title form in parentheses (Do not include the parentheses in the citation. Short forms are not italicised only the first citation and that is designed to easily discriminate article and chapter titles from book or journal collections.:

Abu’l-Qasim Afnan, Black Pearls: Servants in the Households of the Báb and Bahá’u’lláh (Los Angeles: Kalimát Press, 1988), 10-15. – (Afnan, Black Pearls 10-15)

Africa Teaching Committee Records (National Bahá’í Archives, Wilmette, Ill.; hereinafter abbreviated AFR with box number/folder number), Box 9, Folder 29, February 1953. – (AFR 9/29, February 1953)

Bahá’u’lláh, The Kitáb i Íqán, the Book of Certitude (trans. Shoghi Effendi, 2nd edn., Wilmette, IL: Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1974), 11-12. – (Bahá’u’lláh, Kitáb-i-Íqán 11-12)

The Bahá’í World (vols. 1-12, 1925-54. rpt. Wilmette, IL: Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1980; hereinafter BW), 11:200-1. – (BW 11:200-1)

Alessandro Bausani, ‘‘Abd-al-Bahá’: 1. Life and Work’, in Encyclopaedia Iranica (ed. Ehsan Yarshater, vol.1, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1982), 102-3. – (Bausani, ‘‘Abd-al-Bahá’’ 102-3)

Compilation of Compilations, The. Prepared by the Universal House of Justice, 1963-1990. (2 vols., n.p. [Mona Vale, N.S.W.]: Bahá’í Publications Australia, 1991) 1:21-3. – (Compilation of Compilations 1:21-3)

Mark Perry, The Last War Racism, Spirituality and the Future of Civilization (Oxford:George Ronald, 2005) 21-3. – (Perry, Last War 21-3)

S. Fazel and K. Fananapazir, ‘A Bahá’í approach to the claim of finality in Islam’, Journal of Bahá’í Studies, 1993, 5(3), 17-40 (see 18-21). – (Fazel and Fananapazir, ‘Bahá’í Approach’ 18-21)

Mark A. Foster, ‘Neo-Platonism: framework for a Baha’i ontology’, http://bahai-library.org/unpubl.articles/neoplatonism.framework.html  – (Foster, ‘Neo-Platonism’)

or alternately and preferably embed the hyperlink directly Mark A. Foster, ‘Neo-Platonism: framework for a Baha’i ontology’,  – (Foster, ‘Neo-Platonism’) . There is no need to identify last accessed dates.

Stephen Lambden, ‘Catastrophe, Armageddon and Millennium: some aspects of the Bábí -Bahá’í exegesis of apocalyptic symbolism’, Bahá’í Studies Review, 1999-2000, 9, 81-99 (see 88). – (Lambden, ‘Catastrophe’ 88)

Nalinie Mooten, ‘The Bahá’í Contribution to Cosmopolitan International Relations Theory’, OJBS: Online Journal of Bahá’í Studies, 2007, 1, 4-70 - (Mooten, 'Cosmopolitan' 58). Where a resource exists in print and electronically and is open access or in the public domain then as far as possible cite as for print and aslo insert embedded hyperlink for the electronic version if that is known. Always privilege print versions.

Juan RI Cole, ‘World theology and the Bahá’í Faith’ in The Comity and Grace of Method: Essays in Honor of Edmund R. Perry (Thomas Ryba, George Bond and Herman Tull, (eds), Evanston, Ill:Northwestern University Press, 2004), 391-414.see 399-401. – (Cole, ‘Theology’ 399-401)

Nabíl [Zarandi], The Dawn-Breakers: Nabíl’s Narrative of the Early Days of the Bahá’í Revelation (trans. and ed. Shoghi Effendi, Wilmette, IL: Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1970) 66. – (Nabíl, 'Dawn-Breakers' 66)

Annika Hvithamar, Margit Warburg & Morten Warmind (eds.), Bahá’í and Globalisation (Aaarhus: Aaarhus University Press, 2005, Series: Renner Studies on New Religions, 7). – (Hvithamar et al, 'Globalisation' viii-x).

Peter Smith (ed.), In Iran, (Los Angeles: Kalimát Press, 1986, Series:Studies in Bábí and Bahá’í History, 3).  viii-x. – (Smith, In Iran viii-x)

Illustrations
We do not usually have illustrations in the OJBS: Online Journal of Bahá'í Studies. If you feel illustrations are essential for your paper, please discuss this with the editor. You will be responsible for obtaining any copyright permissions needed.

Preparing and Submitting Your Paper

File format
The OJBS: Online Journal of Bahá'í Studies prefers papers to be submitted in electronic format by e-mail. We prefer to receive files prepared in MS Word (up to version 2007)  or OpenOffice using either ODF, XPS (Xml Paper Specification) , RTF, DOC, DOCX for PC.  Raw text, either ANSI or Unicode is also perfectlyacceptable. HTML and PDF is unacceptable.

Please send your papers to: submissions@ojbs.org

Preparing the text file in your word-processor

Do not use centring or other text formatting commands (eg. paragraph styles, paragraph numbering, line numbering) other than bold and italic in your word-processing software. Use only one font size throughout the text. Use left justification (not full justification).

Use the tab key for paragraph indents. Do not use the space bar to position text.
Do not hyphenate words at the ends of lines.
Do not right-justify the text.
Use bold for the main title and major sub-headings and italics for minor sub-headings
Do not use a hard return anywhere within a paragraph; use hard returns only at the ends of paragraphs, lines of poetry, items in a list, titles, and all levels of headings.
Include contiguous punctuation in the formatting; that is, punctuation immediately following a word should be in the same format as the word.
Do not use headers or footers.
Use the page numbering feature in your word-processing program; don’t manually insert page numbers in your files.
Tables and graphics should not appear in the text file; rather, each table or graphic should be submitted in a separate file. Indicate the placement of tables or graphics within the text using the marker . In addition to submitting an electronic version of your table, it may be necessary to mail or fax a hard copy to the editor. Note credit information if tables or graphics originate from copyrighted sources and obtain permission.

Always keep back-up copies and hard copies of your files, never send your originals.