Some authorities also capitalize titles if they immediately follow the name without the word "the.". Is it Southern or Southern? As Sven Yargs' answer shows, there is a strong descriptivist argument involved. are widely recognized as popular names and are thus capitalized. She moved from the East Coast to the West Coast. As explained in the post, there is no need to capitalize these words when used generically (only when they're part of a proper noun). Do You Capitalize "Real Estate"? The state abbreviations are always in the same format: two letter abbreviations where both letters are uppercase and no periods or spaces between each letter. Here Carlotta is the name hence it needs to be in capital and I, Halloween should be capitalized. When words like northern, southern, eastern, and western precede a place name, they are not ordinarily capitalized, because they merely indicate general location within a region. Only a few signs of the zodiac are automatically capitalized (Capricorn, Gemini, Sagittarius, Taurus). Use capital letters in the following ways: The first words of a sentence When he tells a joke, he sometimes forgets the punch line. The rules are fairly standard for title case: Capitalize the first and the last word. You should always capitalize Southerner since it refers to a group of people who are proper nouns. If you have a question about whether a specific word should be capitalized that doesn't fit under one of these rules, try checking a dictionary to see if the word is capitalized there. The obvious examples of this are countries, states, cities, and other geographical areas: Subscribe to our newsletter and get writing tips from our editors straight to your inbox. Circling back to the "title" rule, if the headline is in sentence case and the word "region" is not the starting word of the title, "region" should be written in lowercase. For example, "western Massachusetts", "northern New Jersey". AP Style states that when referring to the names of a nation, directions should . Is Southern California capitalized AP style? Southern United States, for example, is appropriate because it is located in a specific region. For example, most people would capitalize South London because South London is a well-known part of a famous city. Filed Under: Writing Tagged With: AP style, capitalization, Chicago style, dictionaries. northern New Jersey, western Massachusetts Northern Ireland, Western Australia In some cases, like country and city names, this is clear. Surely not one word Southeast? In other words, directions can be tricky! In terms of "human geography", the regions and their subregions are elucidated by the ethnography discipline. 2 Do you capitalize state when referring to a state? My name is Erin. What is thought to influence the overproduction and pruning of synapses in the brain quizlet? "The South" is capitalized because it designates a definite region, e.g., "I was born and raised in the South." More answers below If these geographic areas are part of a name, however, such as "River Thames", capitalize the term. Names of racial and ethnic groups are treated as proper nouns, which means they are capitalized (e.g., African American, Asian American, Black, European American, First Nations, Hispanic, Native American, Latinx, White). Not capitalizing when referring to a general direction. You should only capitalize directions, such as north, south, east, and west, when you are referring to the direction as a proper noun, such as in the South or up North. If you are merely referring to a direction, such as go south on I-90, then you should keep the direction lowercase. In your first paragraph after the caption you make a good comparison between Wild West and Southern California, but I'm still troubled by a couple of issues. Job seekers, Is Pepsi the owner of KFC? It's similar to why your name is always capitalized. 1. Before capitalizing words like east, west, north, and south, check whether you are using them as part of a proper noun or merely to refer to direction or location.Don't capitalize directions (we sailed due east) and locations (western India), but do capitalize compass points when they occur in proper nouns (North Korea, South Sudan, East Dunbartonshire, the Great Western Plains). So the upshot of my answer is that you didn't miss the memo (or perhaps I should say The Memo) on this issue, but at the same time you didn't notice a larger phenomenon in accordance with which initial-capping Southern California is by no means a unique, inexplicable, or indefensible treatment of a regional name. Hi, Kelly. Thus people who live in southern California may prefer to write Southern California. It's not a continent, nor is it a country. When to capitalize North East south west? You have entered an incorrect email address! When combining with another common noun to form the name for a region . Only capitalize state when it follows the states name, such as New York State is also known as the Empire State, or when it is part of a traditional state name, such as Empire State or Lone Star State, can be capitalized. But when the words are used in specific contexts, denote people belonging to a particular region, or refer to their social, political, or cultural activities, they are capitalized. Here Chemistry and Spanish are the proper nouns. For example, we capitalizenorth,south,east, andwest when the terms refer to regions or cultures: Customs in the East differ from those in the West. Do not capitalize these words when they merely indicate direction or general location. Automatically capitalize your email subjects, essay, headline, and article titles. (Cap or no cap on east and west). In short, it says to capitalize northern, southern, eastern, western and related words when they refer to the PEOPLE in a region or what they DO (i.e., their political, cultural or social activities) or are part of the place name. However, if youre referring to a specific region, such as the east coast of the United States, keep the words lowercase. However, if you use the word southern instead of a general location, such as the southern winds, the word should be lowercase. If youre referring to a collection of proper nouns, such as the Southern States, this is the case. Why are trials on "Law & Order" in the New York Supreme Court? A recognized geographical region. Capitalize north, south, east, west, and derivative words when they designate definite regions or are an integral part of a proper name. With the passage of time, some words originally derived from proper nouns have taken on a life, and authority, of their own and no longer require capitalization. Instead of using the frequently used double-space, only use one space after a period to properly follow AP style guidelines. You don't even want to know what he calls pancakes. Should states and territories be Capitalised? Should Southern colonies be capitalized? Here are a few more examples: When the directional terms are not proper names and are affixed to proper nouns simply to denote direction, they are written in lowercase for example, "southern France", "northern New York", etc. 3. The other concern I have is that southern is a geographical term, that I feel shouldn't be usurped in this way. Have you ever visited the Western United States? Do not capitalize these words when they merely indicate general location or refer to the geography or climate of the region. NOTE: Within certain regions it is not uncommon for many who live there to capitalize the adjective because of the special importance they attach to the regional designation. For example, "Global is a proper noun." . The difference between the phonemes /p/ and /b/ in Japanese. The official USPS postal abbreviation is this format. But the AP Stylebook says to always capitalize Southern when referring to the South in the United States, regardless of whether youre discussing the Civil War. September 18, 2013, at 9:56 pm. I have published a variety of other capitalization posts related to time periods, geographic features, people, and product names. Please note that my close-vote reason was 'lack of reasonable signs of research'; I believe that there are differences between the 'northern Europe' example and this one. When you're talking about America's West Coast or the Middle East, the directional word is also part of a proper name, and it gets a capital letter. Pronouns that refer to any god or gods should be lowercased. Unless they are actually part of the place name, directions dont need to be capitalized, but this depends on personal preference (e.g., if it might make this clearer to the reader) and whether its specified by a style guide. The correct answer is option C. In option A, the word Chemistry is only capitalized leaving the other proper noun in lower case. You should capitalize the words East Coast when referring to a specific region, such as Im traveling to the East Coast, because East Coast is a proper noun in this case. For up-to-date guidance, see the ninth edition of the MLA Handbook. There may be disagreement about where the border of Southern California begins, just as there was and is about the border of the Wild West, but the fact that the Los Angeles metropolitan area, Orange County, and San Diego are all located in Southern California is beyond debate. When to capitalize North East South West? Back East. Southern belle (from French belle 'beautiful') is a colloquialism for a debutante in the planter class of the Antebellum South. Home | About | Contact | Copyright | Report Content | Privacy | Cookie Policy | Terms & Conditions | Sitemap. Besides the global continents, there are also atmospheric and hydrospheric regions that encompass the oceans, discrete climates, or environments above the water and landmasses of earth. That means you should lowercase articles, conjunctions, and prepositionshowever, some style guides say to capitalize conjunctions and prepositions that are longer than five letters. Dates. You should only capitalize directions, such as south, when you are referring to it as the proper noun, such as in the South. If you are merely referring to a direction, such as go south on I-90, then you should keep south lowercase. Why are non-Western countries siding with China in the UN. When a database has been given a proper name, capitalize that name, but do not italicize it or place it inside quote marks. Lowercase with names of nations (southern France) unless they indicate a political division (South Korea). For example, Southern France is capitalized because it is a proper noun and . The Content Authority is where you will find great content, written by amazing writers, around topics like grammar, writing, publishing, and marketing. It was first put into effect for large businesses, but it was gradually adopted as a standardized format by everyone. Please include the research youve done. The state postal codes were formalized into two character abbreviations in 1963. For example, capitalizing "Southerner" in the sentence "As a Southerner, she had a distinct drawl" can be up for debate. The question as to whether something should be considered a name or not is one of style, and as such you should adhere to the discipline of your editor, publication, or organization, or in the absence of a house style, you should adopt a suitable. South Pacific. In general, you should capitalize the first word, all nouns, all verbs (even short ones, like is), all adjectives, and all proper nouns. Capitalize locations in a country if the proper noun is given in other words, the name of a region or city, such as the Congo, the Mississippi River, etc. By clicking Accept All, you consent to the use of ALL the cookies. Todays post explains when to capitalize geographic regions in the United States. One reason partisans capitalize "White" or "Black" is to denote its importance in messages, even subliminally, magnified by lowercasing the "other." As always, we believe that labels can oversimplify, and that a specific description is better. Everyone on the bus tour enjoyed the southern food in Tennessee. What about capitalizing western or Westerner? I live to the west of Detroit Michigan. Other uncategorized cookies are those that are being analyzed and have not been classified into a category as yet. The best answers are voted up and rise to the top, Not the answer you're looking for? Why distinguishes money from other assets in the economy. After all, it was named after its inventor, Edwin Southern, and therefore the use of the capital is justified. Without capitalization, it could refer to anyone in the southern hemisphere, or perhaps southern England. TimesMojo is a social question-and-answer website where you can get all the answers to your questions. The word god is generally not capitalized if it is used to refer to the generic idea of a deity, nor is it capitalized when it refers to multiple gods. There is room for variation here: if you live in Coventry and youre writing for other Coventry residents, then perhaps writing South Coventry would make sense. hbspt.cta._relativeUrls=true;hbspt.cta.load(42679, '809ac5c4-ef90-4489-8311-03d2c90632ee', {"useNewLoader":"true","region":"na1"}); Topics: However, when giving an address, or in tables or other uses in which space is limited, use the US Postal Services symbol system, which consists of a two-letter abbreviation in which both letters are always capitalized and no periods are used (for example, NY for New York).