How to format your references using the The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History. For a complete guide how to prepare your manuscript refer to the journal's instructions to authors.

Using reference management software

Typically you don't format your citations and bibliography by hand. The easiest way is to use a reference manager:

Paperpile	The citation style is built in and you can choose it in Settings > Citation Style or Paperpile > Citation Style in Google Docs.
EndNote	Download the output style file
Mendeley, Zotero, Papers, and others	The style is either built in or you can download a CSL file that is supported by most references management programs.
BibTeX	BibTeX syles are usually part of a LaTeX template. Check the instructions to authors if the publisher offers a LaTeX template for this journal.

Journal articles

Those examples are references to articles in scholarly journals and how they are supposed to appear in your bibliography.

Not all journals organize their published articles in volumes and issues, so these fields are optional. Some electronic journals do not provide a page range, but instead list an article identifier. In a case like this it's safe to use the article identifier instead of the page range.

A journal article with 1 author

Savchenko, Alex. “Materials Science. Transforming Graphene.” Science (New York, N.Y.) 323, no. 5914 (January 30, 2009): 589–90.

A journal article with 2 authors

Wright, Stephen I., and Spencer C. H. Barrett. “Evolution. The Long-Term Benefits of Self-Rejection.” Science (New York, N.Y.) 330, no. 6003 (October 22, 2010): 459–60.

A journal article with 3 authors

Keith, David W., Edward Parson, and M. Granger Morgan. “Research on Global Sun Block Needed Now.” Nature 463, no. 7280 (January 28, 2010): 426–27.

A journal article with 11 or more authors

Liu, Y., J. H. Gao, H. L. Liu, and P. T. Fox. “The Temporal Response of the Brain after Eating Revealed by Functional MRI.” Nature 405, no. 6790 (June 29, 2000): 1058–62.

Books and book chapters

Here are examples of references for authored and edited books as well as book chapters.

An authored book

Thompson, Dennis, John D. Hogan, and Philip M. Clark. Developmental Psychology in Historical Perspective. Oxford, UK: Wiley-Blackwell, 2012.

An edited book

Prade, Henri, and Gilles Richard, eds. Computational Approaches to Analogical Reasoning: Current Trends. Vol. 548. Studies in Computational Intelligence. Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer, 2014.

A chapter in an edited book

Sellami, Mounir, and Mohamed Talbi. “Quality Management in Information Systems for Combating Desertification and Dry Lands Management.” In Desertification and Risk Analysis Using High and Medium Resolution Satellite Data: Training Workshop on Mapping Desertification, edited by Alberto Marini and Mohamed Talbi, 47–57. NATO Science for Peace and Security Series C: Environmental Security. Dordrecht: Springer Netherlands, 2009.

Web sites

Sometimes references to web sites should appear directly in the text rather than in the bibliography. Refer to the Instructions to authors for The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History.

Blog post

Andrew, Elise. “Scientists Create Electric Generator Just One Atom Thick.” IFLScience. IFLScience, October 20, 2014. https://www.iflscience.com/technology/scientists-create-electric-generator-only-one-atom-thick/.

Reports

This example shows the general structure used for government reports, technical reports, and scientific reports. If you can't locate the report number then it might be better to cite the report as a book. For reports it is usually not individual people that are credited as authors, but a governmental department or agency like "U. S. Food and Drug Administration" or "National Cancer Institute".

Government report

Government Accountability Office. “Control of the National Science Foundation Peer Review Study.” Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, March 4, 1977.

Theses and dissertations

Theses including Ph.D. dissertations, Master's theses or Bachelor theses follow the basic format outlined below.

Doctoral dissertation

Damiano, Elizabeth S. “The Effects of Psychological Stress on Physical Health over Time.” Doctoral dissertation, California State University, Long Beach, 2010.

News paper articles

Unlike scholarly journals, news papers do not usually have a volume and issue number. Instead, the full date and page number is required for a correct reference.

New York Times article

Kwak, James. “Getting Away With It.” New York Times, July 5, 2017.

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text

About the journal

Full journal title	The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History
Abbreviation	J. Imp. Commonw. Hist.
ISSN (print)	0308-6534
ISSN (online)	1743-9329
Scope	History Development Political Science and International Relations