Submissions Guidelines

Each issue of Socialist History is organised around a particular theme but freestanding articles are also included. If you intend to contribute an article please contact Francis King, the editor, first. 

Socialist History does not accept unsolicited book reviews. If you would like to review for the journal please contact the Reviews Editor, Dianne Kirby.

Once submission has been agreed, authors should email an electronic copy, preferably in Word. Include brief biographical details and full contact details.

Please refer to these style guidelines when preparing your contribution:

Style guide for Socialist History articles

Length

• Usually 6-8000 words unless otherwise arranged with the editor

Quotations

• Use ‘single quotes’ for quotations ‘and “double inside single”?’
• Long quotations should be indented without quotation marks, in normal font and with a line space at beginning and end
• Punctuation and footnote indicators normally outside of quotes; punctuation inside only if sentence quoted in full

Spelling and capitalisation

• Use English not US spellings, e.g. -ise, not -ize; First World War, not World War I
• Spell out acronyms/abbreviations on first use, e.g.: Independent Labour Party (ILP)
• Lower case preferred for all except proper names, e.g. socialists, the left, parliament.  However, use upper case for all full proper names, e.g. the Labour Party, but the party

Dates and figures

• Give dates in form 12 May 1978; decades as 1900s, 1880s
• Spell out numbers to one hundred
• Hence spell out centuries (including twenty-first!)

References

• In text, give footnote indicators on line if possible, after full stop, thus.62
• Avoid using footnote indicators in the middle of a sentence
• Use endnotes, not footnotes
• In reference list, give full authors’ names; provide date of publication; give page references as p10 or pp12-25 (no space)
• Articles and unpublished sources (including theses) should be given lower case, in quotes, hence: Andy Croft, ‘Mapless in the wilderness. Randall Swingler and 1956’, Socialist History, 19 (2001), pp44-70.
• Books should be given upper case title, lower case subtitle, with place of publication, not publisher, e.g. Alison Macleod, The Death of Uncle Joe. A memoir London, 1997.
• Avoid op cit., ibid., idem., etc. Use, e.g., Macleod, Uncle Joe, p53.

Headings

• Socialist History uses short sub-headings to break up text, rather than as ‘section headings’.  Please provide these headings if possible
• Use upper and lower case for title of article (Mapless in the wilderness), lower case for headings (Culture, politics and the New Reasoner)
• Do not start the article text with a sub-heading

General

• Do not insert bold typeface, even for headings; do use italics where required
• Please provide brief contextual information on names or events mentioned which may be unfamiliar to readers, e.g. the MP and former South Wales miners’ leader, David Watts Morgan.

Style guide for Socialist History book reviews

Length

• Usually 1000-3000 words. Please establish an approximate length with the Reviews Editor

Style

• Full publication details, including the publisher, should be included at the beginning of each review, thus:Noel Thompson, Left in the Wilderness. The political economy of British democratic socialism since 1979, Acumen, London, 2002, ISBN 1 902683 54 4, x + 312pp, £14.95pbk
• Add page references in parenthesis in text if quoting from the book, e.g. (p33)
• Avoid using footnotes