II. CAPITALIZATION
A. When in doubt, do not capitalize.
1) Proper nouns, months, days of the week, but not the seasons.
2) All words, except articles (the, a, an), conjunctions (and, or, for, nor), and short prepositions (of, in, on) in headings and the titles of books, plays, lectures, musical compositions, etc., including A and The if it is the first or last word in a title.
3) Use lower case for academic departments except for words that are proper nouns or adjectives (the department of history, the department of mathematics, the department of English). The official names of departments when used in text; do not capitalize the informal name.
4) All conferred and traditional, educational, occupational, and business titles when used specifically in front of the name; do not capitalize these titles when they follow the name.
President Caroline Whitson, Columbia College
Dr. Laurie B. Hopkins, provost
Note: In tabular matter and addresses, these titles may be capitalized regardless of location.
5) The words Army, Navy, Marines, and Air Force, when referring to U.S. armed forces, whether or not preceded by the letters U.S.
6) The wordsassociation, building, center, club, conference, department, division, hall, office, program, senate, street, etc., when used as part of a title; thereafter, do not capitalize the words when used alone to refer to that specific place or group.
the Department of History; thereafter, the department
7) The words offices, colleges, and departments, when referring to more than one individual office, college, or department.
Colleges of Education and Liberal Arts
8) Board of Trustees; thereafter, the board.
9) A specific course or subject.
ENGL 205 Creative Writing
10) Entire geographic names.
Broad River
Sesquicentennial State Park
11) Geographical regions of the country, but not points of the compass (direction or locality).
the Middle West or the Midwest, but middle western
East Coast, Gulf Coast
in the Southeast or Northern Hemisphere, but northern Atlantic
12) The word Southern when referring to a cultural or area distinction.
Southern cooking
the Southern way of life
13) Names of athletic clubs and teams.
the Fighting Koalas
the Columbia Inferno
14) Figure or Table, and their abbreviations, when used in text to designate a specific insert.
Figure 1 shows the flotation process.
The flotation process (Fig. 1) removes the fish wastes.
15) Names of all races and nationalities.
African American (but black), Caucasian (but white), Nigerian, Irish, Japanese
16) The wordroom when used to designate a particular room.
Room 202 of Cottingham Theatre
17) Official college degrees when spelled out.
Bachelor of Fine Arts, but bachelor’s degree
Master of Education, but master’s degree
18) The major when it appears as part of the degree.
Bachelor of Science in Computer Science
However, lowercase the major when it follows the word degree.
She holds a Bachelor of Science degree in computer science.
19) In headlines, subheads, and publication titles, when one part of a hyphenated compound adjective is capitalized, both parts should be capitalized. However, fractions and compounds containing a prefix are exceptions.
The Two-Headed Monster of Chaos Theory
When Older Students Re-enter College
How to Earn One-half Your Tuition in One Summer
1) Titles standing alone or in apposition.
The chaplain must approve religious activities.
Contact the controller for further information.
Dr. Nancy L. Tuten, professor of English, will speak at the symposium.
2) Names of school or college studies, fields of study, options, curricula, major areas, or major subjects, except languages, unless a specific course is being referred to (see B9).
She is studying psychology and English.
Each student must meet core requirements in biological sciences and liberal arts.
Columbia College offers a curriculum in leadership.
3) The unofficial or informal names of departments when used in text.
She enrolled in the business and economics department.
4) Organized groups or classes of students in a college or high school, or the words freshman (Columbia College uses the term first year), sophomore, junior, senior, or graduate.
Susan Smith is a junior in the department of education.
The senior class will conduct its annual election tomorrow.
However, when referring to a class according to its year of graduation, capitalize Class.
The program was made possible by a gift from the Class of 1988.
5) Unofficial titles preceding a name: comedian Jonathan Winters.
6) The words or abbreviations a.m., p.m., baccalaureate, federal, state, government, honors, page, paragraph.
7) Common names of plants and animals except proper nouns and adjectives:
Queen Anne’s lace, Canada thistle, dandelion, spring beauty.
8) Names of seasons, including references to semesters.
Note: Grammatical rules regarding capitalization are often bent for the sake of visual appeal in headings, display type, and tabular matter.