G2G: Preferred formatting of references and sources

Question

Since getting more involved with WikiTree, I have been trying to go through my connected profiles to add sources, clean up GEDCOM imports, etc. It seems like there are several different styles of formatting for sources, and people don't agree on them. When I add sources to an existing profile, I try to keep the formatting of the existing sources (if it is consistent). However, people will drive by one of the profiles I manage and throw a source in at the bottom in a totally different format. To keep things standardized, I've been trying to use the WikiTree Sourcer extension as much as possible. I also try to put references in the biography rather than just listing the sources at the bottom (which I normally reserve for "See also" types of sources).

The other common style I have run across that active contributors seem to use is where the fact type is in bold, like this:

• 1850 Census: "1850 United States Federal Census"
  The National Archives in Washington D.C.; Record Group: Records of the Bureau of the Census; Record Group Number: 29; Series Number: M432; Residence Date: 1850; Home in 1850: Pontotoc, Mississippi; Roll: 380; Page: 146b; Line Number: 25
  Ancestry Sharing Link - Ancestry Record 8054 #3531680 (accessed 19 December 2022)
  Lucinda Smith (14) in Pontotoc, Mississippi, USA. Born in South Carolina.
• 1857 Marriage: "Mississippi, U.S., Compiled Marriages, 1826-1900"
  Dodd, Jordan, Liahona Research, comp.. Mississippi Marriages, 1826-1900. See Description for original data sources listed by county
  Ancestry Record 4585 #90057024 (accessed 20 December 2022)
  Lucinda Smith marriage to Joseph L. Teeter on 22 Jan 1857 in Pontotoc, Mississippi, USA.

What I would assume is the standard format would be:

1. ↑ "1850 United States Federal Census," database with images, The National Archives in Washington D.C.; Record Group: Records of the Bureau of the Census; Record Group Number: 29; Series Number: M432; Residence Date: 1850; Home in 1850: Pontotoc, Mississippi; Roll: 380; Page: 146b; Line Number: 25, Ancestry Sharing Link - (Ancestry Record 8054 #3531680 : accessed 24 February 2023), Lucinda Smith (14) in Pontotoc, Mississippi, USA. Born in South Carolina.
2. ↑ "Mississippi, U.S., Compiled Marriages, 1826-1900," database, Dodd, Jordan, Liahona Research, comp.. Mississippi Marriages, 1826-1900. See Description for original data sources listed by county, (Ancestry Record 4585 #90057024 : accessed 24 February 2023), Lucinda Smith marriage to Joseph L. Teeter on 22 Jan 1857 in Pontotoc, Mississippi, USA.

Another related issue is how to use inline references. For example, if I'm sourcing in the bio and I want to include every source for a particular marriage, that might include a marriage license, a draft record listing the wife, and 5 census records. That results in multiple subscripts (which seems to bother many people) and looks something like:

He was married to Ida Jones in 1898.^[2][3][4][5] After her death, he had remarried to Villa (Gillentine) Wright by 1930.^[6][7]

I was trying to think of a way to resolve the difference between the two using a difference between the narrative biography, facts, notes, and sources, but it got too complicated and I've seen other disputes and examples that the guide specifically says not to do.

I was able to come up with a format using one of my more complicated ancestors as an example, but still thought that might be too far from the standard style.

So, before I go much further, is there a definitive or even recommended standard (other than everybody doing it their preferred way and sticking to whatever the current profile manager's preference seems to be when editing an existing profile)? The Help:Biographies page seems to leave it open to interpretation.

Even looking at the Help:Examples doesn't really show a common standard, although I think the profile for Charles Schulz looks the most like I would expect it to be based on the current help pages and the way the extensions work.

EDIT: I have completed work on a feature in the WikiTree Browser Extension that allows you to make adjustments to the way sources are displayed. Although it will not affect the majority of casual WikiTree viewers, hopefully more advanced members will find it helpful.

Comments

In my opinion, the standard format is the appropriate format.

The citation with the bold text is something I have never seen other than on this site, starting perhaps a couple of years ago. I think the bold is both unnecessary and not in conformance with any standard style. 

Doug, below, notes the WikiTree preference for Evidence Explained. Their (EE’s) website provides examples of many different citations. If you want more detail the book is readily available from the online book sellers and provides info on citing absolutely everything; my local brick & mortar bookstore doesn’t stock it, but their genealogy section is meager. It you are a bit of a nerd, it makes an interesting addition to your library (and a sure cure for insomnia… trust me, it works!)

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Bolding a "lead" to the citation is done by many (of which group I am one) in order to give visual differentiation for those with sight difficulties.
Likewise, I add line spaces between bullet points under the Sources header because I was told by more than one visually challenged person that they found the citations difficult to near impossible to separate out when they looked like one huge lump of text.
(I don't believe the bold is needed for a screen reader, however this effect was not for those folk, but for others who do not use screen readers, but have other vision issues.)

Accessibility, and inclusiveness, is important.  I dare say it's more important than which style manual we use when adding our citations.

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It does look more readable that way. I don't like to add the spaces between them because then they look different from the inline sources. It would be nice if WikiTree had a way to automatically format lists and sources that way. I am in the app development project now, so I might look into a feature like that. It wouldn't be hard to adjust the style of all lists on the bio page to add space between numbered/bullet items or even to automatically bold the first segment of each source if a user desires that effect.

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I seem to recall a recent question, or post, where someone was asking for greater separation between the way "in line" citations show on view mode (not in edit mode).
Even if they displayed as one can do in a text editor (such as MS Word), where line spacing can be set to 1.0, 1.15, 1.5, 2.0, etc.  The general text does not require such additional line spacing, but it would be good if the citations, both "inline" and bullet-pointed, could have better viewability.

Adding such a function to the app/extension is good for those who actually use it (members), but my cousins, who are not members of this site, are not going to download an app/extension just for a looksee at ancestral profiles.  Nor is the googler who discovered their ancestor's profile and emailed me to say: "this is my (insert relationship here), thank you for (insert whatever)" - or "this is my (insert relationship here), did you know (insert new information)?" or "thank you for making this profile for my (insert relationship here), I like how easy it is to read".

Until such is possible for those general non-app/non-extension people simply casually browsing past the site, I will continue to space my citations as best I can for those with sight difficulties.

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I already have this partially working on the extension, including an option to select the amount of spacing and to choose whether to affect all lists in the profile or only those in the sources section, but I can't control what WikiTree integrates into their main site.

For people to ignore the recommended styles just because they don't like the way it looks to them doesn't seem to be the best approach, though. That makes it very hard to collaborate when two editors prefer different styles.

And, if WikiTree does ever increase the default spacing, yours would be double spaced, which might be part of the reason they've never made that change globally. I will try to make the extension update handle that scenario properly.

I will see if I can address with WT the reason it is preferable to make this a site option vs part of an extension.

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Melanie, options to format the sources section (along with many others) have been added to the WikiTree Browser Extension. Although it will not help the casual viewers that you mentioned, I think you would find it helpful.

I have brought up the issue in the development group, but I don't expect any changes to the WikiTree core regarding this in the near future.

EDIT: Now available in the stable 1.4 release.

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Getting older and vision not as good as it used to be.  I like the bold and spaces between (as already mentioned in comments).

Answer 1

Jonathan,

Good luck.   Unfortunately I am fairly certain you will not be able to get an agreement on best methods or proper formats.  While it seems clear that inline citations are the best method, even that statement will generate disagreements.   (Just wait, I am certain there will be some.)

Just one comment of your use of inline citations for marriage records that you have shown as an example - I see little value in adding multiple census records as support of a marriage.  If you have a marriage record that one source is really sufficient.  If you have a census record with parents of the couple that shows them as a son or daughter that seems worthwhile, and when all else fails a census record showing length of marriage can be useful.     

The problem with tacking a sources at the end of a profile - even though many do it - is that it is not easy to figure out what source goes with what fact.  If the inline citations are done well it is easy to see the source for each fact in the profile and more importantly when additional information is added it is easy to see where it goes with its inline reference.

Comments

Thanks. I agree with what you said, and I like your point about the marriage sources. In general, census records that aren't supporting a specific fact probably could be general sources ordered chronologically and not inline references. Of course, sometimes there is no marriage record, so you have to use multiple census records to estimate the date. The more I think about it, it almost seems like anything that is a complicated scenario should be a research note with multiple sources inline, and that way the flow of the bio doesn't get broken up. However, there's not a way to put a footnote in the bio to a research note, although you can do a normal link. I wish you could either have notes that are separate from references or even multiple named reference blocks, but that's probably getting too complicated again.

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When I am estimating a date I usually just say something like "marriage year estimated from age of first child," and then just citing the census closest to the child's birth, not every census that includes that child.  If I'm guessing at a marriage year, I would use the closest census if possible, but if I really am just guessing I would use a research note to explain how I arrived at the year.  You can always put (see research notes) after something in the bio that you can't really substantiate.

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I cite census record within the narrative when I write something like:

In 1880, Philip and Elizabeth and their three daughters lived at 530 Adams Street in Buffalo, New York. Philip worked as a stationary engineer.<ref>cite the 1880 census...</ref>

Answer 2

Wikitree has stated a preference for citation style is Evidence Explained as indicated at 2 Examples. That is more like your second set of examples. The first set with bold is what the Sourcer plugin creates and doesn't really correspond to established citation styles. What you will see in most genealogical journals will be more like the Evidence Explained style which is a specific application of Chicago Manual of Style citation style with examples for most genealogy source types.

People disagree on how best to do citations.  My personal preference is for EE style.

Note that Sourcer can be setup to do EE style.

Comments

Interesting... I don't recall, but maybe I set it to EE style when I installed it not realizing that the default was the bold way. That could explain why so many others seem to be using that style.

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Will it really do EE/CMOS style citations? Clearly I'm missing something then!

I've figured out how to get rid of the bold and stop it adding in some extra data and information, but otherwise it just seems to pull the citations from FS or Ancestry as they are. The Sourcer probably can't fix bad information that is part of the indexing, but it also seems to put everything in the wrong order.

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It is a reasonable approximation of EE. I do find that it gives what are wrong citations for some things on Ancestry and now on FS. These are due to those websites not providing the right information. This appears to be an attempt to make their site be the only place to go even if the resource is free to view on other sites.

Anyway, if you go to the options for Sourcer there are a few settings that set EE style.

Answer 3

"..people will drive by one of the profiles I manage and throw a source in at the bottom in a totally different format." This may be out of respect, leaving it for you to put it the way you want it.

Answer 4

I like to see the name first in the citation.