Information for Authors
Guidance for authors submitting to the Southwestern Historical Quarterly.
How to Submit an Article
We welcome submissions year-round on any period or theme of Texas or the American Southwest. Articles must make an original contribution, be clearly written, and include citations. A bibliography is not required.
Before You Submit
- Review recent issues of the Quarterly and the guidelines below.
- We follow the Chicago Manual of Style for prose; citations use our in-house format (see Style Guide).
How to Submit
- Send a Microsoft Word file to our Managing Editor, Emily Laskowski, at [email protected].
- Include the article title on the manuscript (no separate title page required).
- Peer review is anonymous and typically takes 2–4 months.
Manuscript Format
- Double-spaced throughout (text, block quotes, notes, captions).
- 12-pt Times New Roman; 1-inch margins; pages numbered consecutively.
- Notes double-spaced in a section at the end.
- Maximum length: ~40 pages / ~12,000 words (including notes).
Illustrations
- Indicate planned illustrations at submission.
- If accepted, the author obtains images, permissions, and pays any usage fees.
Questions? Please contact our Managing Editor, Emily Laskowski, at [email protected].
Copyright Information
- With first proofs, authors receive two copyright forms: sign and return one; keep one for your records.
- As a condition of publication, copyright is assigned to the Texas State Historical Association.
- Authors warrant the work is original and unpublished, or that any prior rights have been cleared.
- After publication, TSHA will grant permission to republish upon written request with proper credit to the Quarterly.
- Authors may deposit their articles in institutional open-access repositories one year after publication.
- For questions, consult Chicago Manual of Style (Chapter 4) or contact the publications department.
How to Write an Article
by Editor Randolph B. "Mike" Campbell
Southwestern Historical Quarterly editor Mike Campbell offers some suggestions concerning how to design, research, and write an article-length manuscript for publication in the Quarterly:
A vitally important first step is to examine five to ten articles that appeared in recent numbers of the Quarterly. Try to determine the characteristics—in terms of design, research, and writing—that these articles have in common. Also, pay close attention to the mechanics, especially documentation form, of these articles.
Design your study by determining exactly the subject that you intend to research and then describe and analyze in your manuscript. You may begin by saying "I want to look at the Republican Party during Reconstruction in Texas," but once you have acquainted yourself with the existing literature and thought about what is unknown or controversial about the subject, you should narrow your focus to a specific and manageable question. For example, the existing literature may show that Texas Republicans during Reconstruction suffered greatly from intra-party factionalism, but the nature of that factionalism may not be fully explained. Thus your research could focus on answering the question: What explains the factionalism that plagued the Republican Party during Reconstruction in Texas?
Research your manuscript by beginning with general secondary accounts (textbook accounts of Reconstruction in Texas), moving from there to more specific secondary accounts (studies of the Republican Party in Texas or of Reconstruction in Texas) to primary sources (newspapers, manuscript collections left by Republican leaders, journals of the constitutional conventions of Reconstruction, etc.) Use your imagination in the search for primary sources.
Write your manuscript with particular attention to the following:
- The Introduction has to explain exactly what you are going to do. Use a nice anecdote or an "artistic" setting of the stage if you like ("Two days before the Twelfth Legislature assembled in Austin, Gov. Edmund J. Davis could no longer contain his anger at the petty feuds that threatened his fledgling party. 'Never,' he wrote to his trusted Republican colleague J. P. Newcomb, 'have I encountered such a band of self-destructive fools.'") However, the introduction must provide historiographical context (what has been written on the subject and where your work fits in it) and the question that your article will answer.
- The Body of the Manuscript has to do what you promised in the introduction. Above all, it must be organized so that it is easy to follow, allowing the reader to see that it is related to what you promised. Strive for clarity first; then worry about style.
- The Conclusion must summarize exactly what you have proven—and nothing more. Do not make claims that you have not substantiated. If you want to speculate, make it absolutely clear that you are speculating. ("This study suggests ....")
The rules for creating a manuscript that is publishable in a scholarly journal may be summarized as follows:
- Tell the readers what you are going to tell them
- Tell the readers what you have to tell them
- Tell the readers what you told them
- Stop
Style Guide
We follow the Chicago Manual of Style, 17th ed. (2017), for grammar, style, and usage. For spelling and hyphenation we use Merriam-Webster Unabridged.
Citations (House Style)
- Document all facts not of common knowledge.
- Each paragraph requiring documentation should have its own note.
- Quotations must include exact page or date.
- Notes are numbered consecutively with superscripts; multiple citations within a note are separated by semicolons.
- Use roman type for ibid. (entire previous note only) and et al.
- For repeat citations, use author’s last name + shortened title (not “op. cit.” or “loc. cit.”; do not use “passim” or “ff.”).
- When citing a chapter, give inclusive page numbers rather than “Chapter X.”
Archival Material
- Cite from smallest to largest unit; give repository in parentheses at the end.
- If using abbreviations on subsequent references, define them at first use (e.g., Ima Hogg Papers, hereafter IHP; Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, hereafter CAH).
Scope and Placement
- Keep discursive notes brief; important discussion belongs in the text.
- Place citations after any discursive material within a note.
- When a person’s name appears for the first time in note prose, give the full name.
Aim for sufficient detail so other researchers can locate the same sources.
Citation Examples by Source Type
Use the following links to navigate to the citation examples for each source type. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact us.
- Books
- Periodicals
- Newspapers
- Archival Material
- Congressional Records
- National Archives
- Census
- Dissertations and Theses
- Interviews and Correspondence
- Internet Sources
- Maps
- Music
- Illustrations
- Tables
- Biographical Information & Acknowlegements
Books
Basic citation:
Samuel P. Huntington, The Soldier and the State: The Theory and Politics of Civil-Military Relations (New York: Vintage Books, 1957), 261 (quotation), 262–264.
Elizabeth Fox-Genovese, Within the Plantation Household: Black and White Women of the Old South (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1988), 109–116.
Shorthand Format:
Huntington, The Soldier and the State, 262.
Fox-Genovese, Within the Plantation Household, 109–112.
Multi-volume:
H. P. N. Gammel (comp.), The Laws of Texas, 1822–1897 (10 vols.; Austin: Gammel Book Co., 1898), I, 1094.
Shorthand Format:
Gammel (comp.), The Laws of Texas, I, 1094.
Edited volume:
Chester V. Kielman (ed.), The University of Texas Archives: A Guide to the Historical Manuscripts Collections in the University of Texas Library (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1967), 227.
Shorthand Format:
Kielman (ed.), The University of Texas Archives, 227.
Article in edited volume:
Robin F. Scott, "Wartime Labor Problems and Mexican-Americans in the War," in An Awakened Minority: The Mexican-Americans, ed. Manuel P. Servin (Beverly Hills: Glencoe Press, 1974), 134–142.
Shorthand Format:
Scott, "Wartime Labor Problems and Mexican-Americans in the War," 134.
Author, editor, and/or translator:
Jean Louis Berlandier, The Indians of Texas in 1830, ed. John C. Ewers, trans. Patricia Reading Leclercq (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1969), 2, 24, 105.
Shorthand Format:
Berlandier, The Indians of Texas in 1830, 24.
Reprint:
Raphael P. Thian (comp.), Notes Illustrating the Military Geography of the United States, 1813–1880, ed. John M. Carroll (1881; reprint, Austin: University of Texas Press, 1979), 58, 77, 89.
Mattie Austin Hatcher, The Opening of Texas to Foreign Settlement, 1801–1821 (Austin: University of Texas press, 1927; reprint, Philadelphia: Porcupine Press, 1976), 273–274.
Shorthand Format:
Thian (comp.), Notes Illustrating the Military Geography of the United States, 77.
Hatcher, The Opening of Texas to Foreign Settlement, 273.
Later or revised editions:
Clyde White, Administration of Public Welfare (2nd ed.; New York: American Book Co., 1950), 35–55.
Oscar Theodore Barek Jr. and Nelson Manfred Blake, Since 1900: A History of the United States in Our Times (rev. ed.; New York: Macmillan Co., 1952), 217, 223.
Shorthand Format:
White, Administration of Public Welfare, 35–55.
Barek and Blake, Since 1900, 217.
Part of series:
Julian H. Steward (ed.), Handbook of South American Indians, Smithsonian Institution, Bureau of Ethnology no. 143 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1949), 216.
Arthur H. R. Fairchild, Shakespeare and the Arts of Design, University of Missouri Studies, vol. 12 (Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1937), 14, 183.
Shorthand Format:
Steward (ed.), Handbook of South American Indians, 216.
Fairchild, Shakespeare and the Arts of Design, 183.
Place and/or date of publication not given in book but found elsewhere:
Joseph M. Dawson, The Spiritual Conquest of the Southwest ([Nashville]: Sunday School Board of the Southern Baptist Convention, [1927]), 25, 98.
Place and/or date of publication unknown:
Joseph Moore, Job: Patience, Cowardice, or Integrity? (n.p., n.d.), 413–419.
Jeremiah Smith, The Old Gentlemen with White Canes (Cody, Wyo.: [n.p.], 1941), 17, 25.
Jessica Olden, When Flowers Stopped Blooming (Lancaster, Tex.: Blake Printing Co., [n.d.]), 6.
Handbook of Texas (print edition):
Eugene C. Barker, "Stephen Fuller Austin," in Walter Prescott Webb and H. Bailey Carroll (eds.), The Handbook of Texas (2 vols.; Austin: Texas State Historical Association, 1952), I, 81–84.
David G. McComb, "Houston, Texas," in Eldon Stephen Branda (ed.), The Handbook of Texas: A Supplement (Austin:Texas State Historical Association, 1976), 407–410.
Stephen L. Hardin, "Battle of the Alamo," in Ron Tyler, Douglas E. Barnett, Roy R. Barkley, Penelope C. Anderson, and Mark F. Odintz (eds.), The New Handbook of Texas (6 vols.; Austin: Texas State Historical Association, 1996), I, 83–87.
Margaret Swett Henson, "Samuel May Williams," in Roy R. Barkley and Mark F. Odintz (eds.), The Portable Handbook of Texas (Austin: Texas State Historical Association, 2000), 971.
Shorthand Format:
Barker, "Stephen Fuller Austin," 83.
Hardin, "Battle of the Alamo," 84–85.
Second reference to Handbook, but to a different entry:
Crystal Sasse Ragsdale, "Germans in Texas," in Branda (ed.), The Handbook of Texas Supplement, 335–336.
"George McKnight," in Tyler, et al. (eds.), The New Handbook of Texas, IV, 423.
Lewis L. Gould, "Lyndon Baines Johnson," in Barkley and Odintz (eds.), The Portable Handbook of Texas, 476-478.
Periodicals
Please note that Arabic numerals instead of Roman numerals are used for the volume numbers of journals regardless of the style in which the journal prints those numbers.
Basic citation:
L. Tuffly Ellis, "Maritime Commerce on the Far Western Gulf, 1861–1865," Southwestern Historical Quarterly 77 (October 1973): 167–226.
No publication month:
Jere Franco, "The Alabama-Coushatta and Their Texas Friends," East Texas Historical Journal 27, No. 1 (1989): 33, 36.
Shorthand Format:
Ellis, "Maritime Commerce on the Far Western Gulf," 172–173.
Newspapers
City appears in the masthead:
Austin American-Statesman, Mar. 22, June 4, 1927.
Houston Press, Mar. 10, 1930.
Dallas Morning News, May 12, 1954.
City does not appear in the masthead:
Gazeta constitucional de Nuevo León (Monterrey), Jan. 14, Feb. 23, 1829.
Texas State Gazette (Austin), Nov. 15, 1856.
For references to newspapers published in sections, please include the name, number, or letter of the section as well as the page number. References to a specific article may also include the author's name and title of the article. See the Chicago Manual of Style, 15.236.
Archival Materials
Archival citations list the information from the specific to the general. The respository and its location should be the last thing in the citation.
Typescript:
Harry Yandell Benedict, "History of the University of Texas" (3 vols.; typescript), I, 5, Harry Yandell Benedict Papers (Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, University of Texas at Austin), cited hereafter as CAH.
Shorthand Format:
Benedict, "History of the University of Texas" (3 vols.; typescript), I, 5, Benedict Papers.
Clipping:
O. M. Roberts to Marble Falls Standard, June 27, 1896, photostat in Oran M. Roberts folder, Clippings File: Biographical (CAH).
Letter:
James Magoffin to the Committee of El Paso County, Aug. 5, 1852, Governors' Papers: Peter H. Bell (Archives Division, Texas State Library, Austin).
Shorthand Format:
James Magoffin to the Committee of El Paso County, Aug. 5, 1852, Governors' Papers: Bell.
Record groups:
John A. Williams to Political Chief at Nacogdoches, July 3, 1835, copy in Domestic Correspondence, Secretary of State Records, RG 307 (Archives Division, Texas State Library, Austin).
Shorthand Format:
W. B. Travis to S. F. Austin, Nov. 16, 1835, Provisional Government Letterbook, State Department Letterbook No. 3, pp. 75–76, RG 307.
If there are record groups with the same number at different archives and you are citing both, the name of the archive must be included in the subsequent citations as well as the record group number.
University of Texas and Texas A&M University records:
University of Texas Board of Regents Minutes, vol. F, July 10, 1923, p. 143, Archives of the Board of Regents (Ashbel Smith Hall, Austin).
University of Texas Board of Regents Minutes, vol. A, 65 (microfilm; Center for American History, University of Texas at Austin).
Agricultural and Mechanical College of Texas Board of Directors Minutes, vol. 4, Nov. 26, 1924, p. 27 (Director's Office, Texas A&M University).
Shorthand Format:
Regents Minutes, vol. F, July 29, 1924, p. 287.
Directors Minutes, vol. 4, Jan. 7, 1925, p. 25.
Historical Files, Chancellor's Records (Archives, Texas A&M University Library).
County records:
Title Bond, William J. Bryan to William N. Hall, Aug. 22, 1866, Book H: pp.88–89, Brazos County Deed Records, Brazos County Courthouse, Bryan, Texas.
Shorthand Format:
Title Bond, William J. Bryan to William N. Hall.
Congressional Records
William H. Emory, Report on the United States and Mexican Boundary Survey, 91, H. Exec. Doc. 135, 34th Cong., 1st Sess., 1856 (Serial 861).
Congressional Globe, 31st Cong., 1st Sess. (1850), 244–245.
Minutes of the Joint Boundary Commission, Feb. 15, 1850, S. Exec. Doc. 119, Report of the Secretary of the Interior, 32nd Cong., 1st Sess., 1852 (Serial 626), 65.
Public Law 88-352, July 2, 1964, United States Statutes at Large, 1964, 78 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1965), 241–245, 246 (quotation), 247–268.
Shorthand Format
John Russell Bartlett to Lt. Amiel W. Whipple, Dec. 15, 1850, S. Exec. Doc. 119, 32nd Cong., 1st Sess., 32.
Public Law 88-352, United States Statutes at Large, 1964, 246–249, 252–253.
National Archives
"Military Records of Colonel George L. Andrews, 25th Infantry, U.S.A.," Adjutant General's Office, Record Group 94 (National Archives).
George L. Andrews to Adjutant General, U.S. Army, Sept. 20, 1873, Adjutant General's Office, Letterbook, vol. 16, p. 103, RG 94 (National Archives).
James D. Lucas to John M. Clayton, May 18, 1849. Despatches from United States Consuls in Ciudad Juárez (El Paso del Norte), 1850–1906, General Records of the Department of State, RG 59 (microfilm: National Archives).
If there are record groups with the same number at different archives and you are citing both, the name of the archive must be included in the second citation.
Census
U.S. Department of the Interior, Census Office, Report on the Social Statistics of Cities, comp. George E. Waring Jr., vols. 18 and 19 of the reports of the tenth census (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1886–1887), XIX, 305.
United States Seventh Census (1850), Matagorda County, Texas, Schedule 1 (Free Inhabitants), Record Group 29 (National Archives, Washington, D.C.).
United States Tenth Census (1880), and United States Twelfth Census (1900), Travis County, Texas, Population Schedules, City of Austin (microfilm; Austin-Travis County Collection, Austin Public Library; cited hereafter as ATCC).
U.S. Bureau of the Census, Fifteenth Census of the United States: 1930. Unemployment (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1931), I, 952–953.
Dissertations and theses
David C. De Boe, "United States Policy at the Geneva Disarmament Conference, 1932–1934" (Ph.D. diss., Tulane University, 1969), 47.
Stephen Joseph Kraus, "Water, Sewers, and Streets: The Acquisition of Public Utilities in Austin, Texas, 1875–1930" (M.A. thesis, University of Texas at Austin, 1973), 16.
Shorthand Format:
De Boe, "United States Policy at the Geneva Disarmament Conference," 47.
Kraus, "Water, Sewers, and Streets," 16.
Interviews and correspondence
Emory Carlson to Debbie Cottrell, Oct. 20, 1987, interview (tapes in possession of the author).
Bruce Marshall to J. M. Nance, Apr. 18, 1976 (original in possession of author).
George B. Ward to Jerry D. Thompson, Nov. 1, 1999, e-mail (printed copy in possession of the author).
Shorthand Format:
Carlson to Cottrell, Oct. 20, 1987 (interview).
Marshall to Nance, Apr. 18, 1976.
Ward to Thompson, Nov. 1, 1999.
Internet sources
Web sites:
"Samuel E. Chamberlain's My Confession," <http://www.tshaonline.org/supsites/chamber/> [Acessed Apr. 26, 2010].
The Handbook of Texas Online:
"Gilmer, Texas," The Handbook of Texas Online, <http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/GG/hfg4.html> [Accessed Apr. 26, 2010].
Listserv Messages:
Ricky Dobbs, "Review: Cantrell, Stephen F. Austin: Empresario of Texas," H-TEXAS, [email protected], Dec. 9, 1999. Archived at: http://www.h-net.msu.edu/~texas/
Maps
Published:
Stephen Fuller Austin, Map of Texas (Philadelphia: H. S. Tanner, 1830).
Manuscript:
Nicholas Rightor, "Map of the Country Between the Brassos and La Baca Rivers," 1822, Stephen F. Austin Map Collection (Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, University of Texas at Austin).
From book:
a published map: Thomas Gamaliel Bradford, Texas, 1835, in Robert Sidney Martin and James C. Martin, Contours of Discovery: Printed Maps Delineating the Texas and Southwestern Chapters in the Cartographic History of North America, 1513–1930. A User's Guide (Austin: Texas State Historical Association, 1982), 25.
a manuscript map: José Maria Puelles, "Mapa Geografica de las Provincias Septentrionales de Esta Nueva Espana," in Matin and Martin, Contours of Discovery, 22.
Online:
Texas, from The New Encyclopedia Atlas and Gazetter of the World, 1917 (PCL Map Collection) <http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/historical/texas_1917.jpg> [Accessed Feb. 5, 2001].
Shorthand Format:
Austin, Map of Texas.
Rightor, "Map of the Country Between the Brassos and La Baca Rivers."
Bradford, Texas, in Martin and Martin, Contours of Discovery, 25.
Music
Songs:
Slim Willet, "Roughneck," Texas Oil Patch Songs by Slim Willet, Winston LP 1040 (1959).
Shorthand Format:
Willet, "Roughneck."
Illustrations
Illustrations are an important component of our books and Quarterly articles. Authors should indicate upon submission how articles and books will be illustrated. They should provide photocopies of potential illustrations, information regarding the sources of these illustrations, and captions and credits for the illustrations with their submission. Every article in the Quarterly must have at least one illustration for its opening spread, and each article can accommodate from five to ten images. For books and articles, authors should indicate in the margin or within the text of the manuscripts approximately where each illustration should appear, and they should use a numbering system for each illustration that identifies the order in which the illustration will appear (see caption discussion below). If an article or book is accepted for publication and the editors choose to use some or all of the illustrations accompanying the submission, the author will be responsible for providing either digital images of those illustrations. We prefer to use JPEG or TIFF files. Your editor can advise you regarding the best way to submit digital images for reproduction.
Authors are responsible for ordering prints or digital files of the illustrations that will be used with their articles. When a manuscript is accepted for publication, the author should immediately order and collect the images to ensure that the editors have them in hand when production begins.
For books with many illustrations, captions and illustrations should be numbered to correspond to the chapter and order in which they will appear (e.g., illustration 1.1 is the first illustration in chapter 1). These numbers should be used in the text to designate the location of each illustration.
Captions for artwork, daguerreotypes, and the like should include the title or subject of the work, the name of the artist, the date, the medium, the dimensions (height by width in feet and inches), and a credit line, in that order. When dimensions are given for an image that has been copied from a book or other printed matter, rather than from the original, they should refer to the size of the original itself, rather than to the size at which it was reproduced. Authors are responsible for securing necessary permissions to reproduce illustrations and for paying the usage fees for the illustrations.
Tables
All tabular material should be separate from the text, in a series of tables numbered consecutively with Arabic numerals in the order of their appearance in the text. Each table should be printed on a separate page, double-spaced, and identified by a short descriptive title centered at the top. Notes for tables appear at the bottom of each table and are marked with lowercase superscript letters. Indicate in the text approximately where each table should appear in the text. Do not embed tables as part of the article; save tables as a separate file.
Biographical Information & Acknowlegements
For both books and articles, an author should provide a brief biographical statement that is separate from the text and notes, so that it can be easily removed for the peer review process. This is also the place for an author to thank individuals and institutions for assistance. If an article is accepted for publication in the Quarterly, the acknowledgment will become the first unnumbered note. Such acknowledgments should be brief. For book-length manuscripts acknowledgments and biographical information should be saved as separate files.