# EN: Capitalization rules of titles - Majuscules dans les titres d'œuvre



## zon34

Bonjour à tous,

en lisant de la documentation technique en anglais cette après-midi (on s'occupe comme on peut hein ), je me suis aperçut que tous les mots de chaque titre avait leur première lettre en majuscule.

Ex: Conductivity In A Transistor.

Est-ce une erreur ou une règle générale (pour AE ? BE ?) ?

Merci d'avance pour vos réponses.


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## Slobadan

J e comprends pas ce que tu veux dire avec "pour AE ? BE?" mais tu puex utiliser les letters majuscules ou miniscule - C'est question de style tout simplement mais on trouve plus souvent les letter majuscules pour les titres


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## zon34

AE = American English, BE = British English.

Merci pour la réponse. Je clarifie juste un peu ma question. Ce qui m'a "choqué", c'est la majuscule sur la première lettre de chaque mot. Est-ce courant en anglais ?


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## xymox

Bonjour,

Pour Slobadan
AE (American English
BrE (British English)

Pour zon34:

Il est très très rare qu'on ne voit pas les titres en lettres majuscules en anglais, sauf les prépositions (selon mon expérience), par exemple, je n'aurais pas mis le IN et le A en majuscule, sauf s'ils osnt au début du titre, mais le reste, oui. 
Ce n'est pas une erreur mais à savoir si c'est une règle de grammaire, je ne me souviens plus..... mais une règle générale, oui.


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## Slobadan

Oui - j'suis d'accord.

Et merci pur la clarification !


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## zon34

Ok, donc pour conclure, pas de règle de grammaire, mais il s'agit d'une chose courante.

Merci à vous deux pour votre aide.


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## xymox

Bonjour,

J'ai trouvé ceci.

C'est bien une règle sauf pour les prépositions si celles-ci ne sont pas au début. Oufff, ma gramaire anglaise est très très loin, de toute évidence!


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## jann

Bonjour,

Il y a bien des règles de typographie qui gouvernent les majuscules dans les titres d'oeuvres, et effectivement on en met en anglais là où il n'y en aurait pas en français. Nous avons regroupé un nombre de liens utiles à ce sujet ici sur le sous-forum Ressources... […] 

Jann
Modératrice


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## Kotuku33

OK everyone: here's a thorny one. I have a title *in English* but containing a French word and I'm not sure how to capitalize that word. The title is:
From Souvenirs to Objets d'Art (or: D'Art? or: D'art?)

Thank you for your wisdom!


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## jann

From Souvenirs to Objets d'Art 
This one gets my vote.

We do capitalize nouns in titles, but we don't capitalize prepositions.  I would go ahead an apply the same rules to the foreign term.  You might consider italicizing the French word.


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## Sedulia

English capitalization rules are not completely simple. For example, we don't capitalize "to" or "in" unless they are the first word of a title, but we do capitalize "from" and "with"-- maybe because they're longer? In any case, there are fairly standard rules that govern both British and American titles and it looks very odd to native speakers when the words are not capitalized in a title. However many native speakers do not know all the rules and capitalize everything, as in your example, which properly should have been _Conductivity in a Transistor_.


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## uptown

jann said:


> From Souvenirs to Objets d'Art
> This one gets my vote.
> 
> We do capitalize nouns in titles, but we don't capitalize prepositions.  I would go ahead an apply the same rules to the foreign term.  You might consider italicizing the French word.


I like how you wrote that the first time: From Souvenirs to Objets d'Art

After all, *d'* is a preposition.


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## uptown

Sedulia said:


> English capitalization rules are not completely simple. For example, we don't capitalize "to" or "in" unless they are the first word of a title, but we do capitalize "from" and "with"-- maybe because they're longer? In any case, there are fairly standard rules that govern both British and American titles and it looks very odd to native speakers when the words are not capitalized in a title. However many native speakers do not know all the rules and capitalize everything, as in your example, which properly should have been _Conductivity in a Transistor_.


The rules for prepositions can vary according to the style guide you're following for your organization or school.

I learned these rules in grade school:


Capitalize the first and last word of any title.
Capitalize all nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, standard adverbs, and interjections.
Never capitalize prepositions (or the word *to* when it forms part of an infinitive), unless they are "long" or they are the first/last word. You also don't capitalize short prepositions that function as adverbs or intensifiers. So the title would be "A Plan up in Smoke" and not "A Plan Up in Smoke."
Never capitalize conjunctions, unless it's the first or last word.


How long? That was always unclear (at least it was unclear in the grammar books we had at my school), but it seemed like five letters was a cutoff. Maybe you capitalize "about," maybe not. You would capitalize the word 

The rules from the Associated Press Stylebook (which we use at my job), however, stipulate capitalizing any preposition that has more than three letters. I personally find it strange/shocking to capitalize words like "with." I'm sure other style guides give their own rules. I don't believe the Chicago Manual of Style or the MLA Style Manual has a limit that short for capitalizing prepositions in titles, and I don't know the norms for any British style books.


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## Kotuku33

I think I will go with Objets d'Art. I had thought about treating the d' like in English, as a preposition. But if I do that, I'm not sure whether I should italicize the phrase. If I do, that implies that I should also be applying the French convention for capitalization, which I guess would mean "objets d'art". That would look funny... Is objets d'art a commonly used phrase in English?


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## uptown

Kotuku33 said:


> I think I will go with Objets d'Art. I had thought about treating the d' like in English, as a preposition. But if I do that, I'm not sure whether I should italicize the phrase. If I do, that implies that I should also be applying the French convention for capitalization, which I guess would mean "objets d'art". That would look funny... Is objets d'art a commonly used phrase in English?


It's common in an art context, but it's always pronounced (at least in the US) rather closely to the original French pronunciation. And so, I'd still like it to be italicized. Generally, I wouldn't italicize the word souvenir, as it's much more common. However, it might make sense to balance.

As a stickler for rules I'd probably go with this:

From _Souvenirs_ to _Objets d'Art_

Of course, if this is the title of a book, the title itself should be italicized when used in a sentence. And in that case, you'd want to refer to a style guide to see what to do with the foreign words. It gets tricky!


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## jann

Kotuku33 said:


> I'm not sure whether I should italicize the phrase. If I do, that implies that I should also be applying the French convention for capitalization


I'm not sure I agree with that logic.  From my point of view, you're writing a title (of a book, or an article, or a chapter, or an informative panel for a museum, or whatever) in English.  You should therefore use English capitalization rules, even if that title includes foreign words... regardless of how widely-used those words of French origin are in English.


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## uptown

I agree with jann's logic (obviously by my earlier response).


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## Keith Bradford

The Anglo-American cataloguing rules, followed by librarians and those writing academic papers, say that only the first word of a title (and proper nouns of course) should be capitalised.  So, for example: _Objets d'art in the Netherlands_.  Whether you're using italics or inverted commas, either would make it clear that you're dealing with a title, so the other capitals aren't needed.


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## uptown

Keith Bradford said:


> The Anglo-American cataloguing rules, followed by librarians and those writing academic papers, say that only the first word of a title (and proper nouns of course) should be capitalised.  So, for example: _Objets d'art in the Netherlands_.  Whether you're using italics or inverted commas, either would make it clear that you're dealing with a title, so the other capitals aren't needed.


Catalog(u)ing rules and academic papers are apparently different, then, from capitalization rules of normal titles of books, stories, articles, etc.


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## djweaverbeaver

Keith Bradford said:


> The Anglo-American cataloguing rules, followed by librarians and those writing academic papers, say that only the first word of a title (and proper nouns of course) should be capitalised.  So, for example: _Objets d'art in the Netherlands_.  Whether you're using italics or inverted commas, either would make it clear that you're dealing with a title, so the other capitals aren't needed.



I do not agree with your explanation, as different disciplines apply different rules and conventions based on different authorities.  In the U.S., for instance, the humanities generally follow MLA's guidelines (Modern Language Association);  the APA is for psychology, education, social sciences and nursing; ACS for chemistry.  There's also the ASA, the Chicago Manual of Style, Turabian, Government publication guidelines, and so on and so forth.

On the other hand, that is exactly how I would have written your example title.


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## wildan1

uptown said:


> I learned these rules in grade school:
> 
> 
> Capitalize the first and last word of any title.
> Capitalize all nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, standard adverbs, and interjections.
> Never capitalize prepositions (or the word *to* when it forms part of an infinitive), unless they are "long" or they are the first/last word. You also don't capitalize short prepositions that function as adverbs or intensifiers. So the title would be "A Plan up in Smoke" and not "A Plan Up in Smoke."
> Never capitalize conjunctions, unless it's the first or last word.
> ​Never capitalize articles (a, the) unless they are the first or last word



One basic rule was missing from the list, added in blue above.


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