by Jennie Ruby
Capitalization is predominantly a matter of style. Tomes like the Chicago Manual of Style list pages of examples of what to capitalize and what not to capitalize. The Government Printing Office style guide is famous for indicating caps for all kinds of government entities, positions, and titles that other style guides would not capitalize. So the best answer on capitalization is always, "Check your style guide."
That having been said, here are some common rules.
Capitalize a title before a person's name, because it is considered part of the proper name:
- General Illych Buchansal, General Buchansal, Buchansal
- President George W. Bush, President Bush, Bush
- Editor-in-Chief Cindy Logan, Editor Logan, Logan
In all of these examples, you do not have to repeat the title every time the person's name is used. After the first time you should use just the last name unless you are trying to be extremely formal:
- President George W. Bush did this, Bush also did that.
Do not capitalize a title after the name in text:
- Illych Buchansal, a general in the Turkish army
- George W. Bush, president of the United States
- Cindy Logan, editor-in-chief of our magazine
An exception to capitalizing after the name occurs when you are listing the staff on the masthead of a publication, or listing staff members or officers in an annual report or the like. Then you do capitalize the job title listed after the name, like this:
- Cindy Logan, Editor-in-Chief
- Andrew Nguyen, Art Director
Do not capitalize titles when you are listing multiple people who hold or have held that position:
- We invited presidents Clinton and Bush to the ceremony.
- They asked justices Souter and Thomas to supplement the opinion.
About the Author: Jennie Ruby is a veteran IconLogic trainer and author with titles such as "Essentials of Access 2000" and "Editing with MS Word 2003 and Adobe Acrobat 7" to her credit. Jennie specializes in electronic editing. At the American Psychological Association, she was manager of electronic publishing and manager of technical editing and journal production. Jennie has an M.A. from George Washington University and is a Certified Technical Trainer (Chauncey Group). She is a publishing professional with 20 years of experience in writing, editing and desktop publishing.