Text Formatting ⇒ Trouble with dissertation formatting in Turabian style

[alarswilson]

I actually posted a few times last year, but I'm essentially new. Growing tired of Word's opacity I decided to write my dissertation in the Humanities using LaTeX. I've already successfully defended, but now I have a long list of things from the formatting checker that I need to resolve before I can submit the final copy. These are all annoying carryovers from the typewriter days, but there is no way to change them now.

The two biggest issues are section chapter/header formatting and block quotes.

I tried to decipher titlesec, but I'm in over my head.

Chapter/Section headings:
* Chapter: Normal font size, bold, all caps
* Subheading: Normal font size, Italic
* Sub-subheading: Normal font size
* Each heading preceded by two blank lines (one doublespace, then a singlespace), and followed by a normal doublespace (one blank line), no widowed headings
* first paragraph after every heading, including chapter, must be indented .5"

Block quotes:
* first line not indented


There are several more issues as well, but this is a starter. Please help this humanities writer out. Thanks

[kaiserkarl13]

Which document class are you attempting to use now, and which University are you writing for? There may be a specific document class that you can use and/or modify.

If you're using report, look for lines like this:

Code: Select all

\newcommand\section{\@startsection {section}{1}{\z@}%
                                   {-3.5ex \@plus -1ex \@minus -.2ex}%
                                   {2.3ex \@plus.2ex}%
                                   {\normalfont\Large\bfseries}}
\newcommand\subsection{\@startsection{subsection}{2}{\z@}%
                                     {-3.25ex\@plus -1ex \@minus -.2ex}%
                                     {1.5ex \@plus .2ex}%
                                     {\normalfont\large\bfseries}}
\newcommand\subsubsection{\@startsection{subsubsection}{3}{\z@}%
                                     {-3.25ex\@plus -1ex \@minus -.2ex}%
                                     {1.5ex \@plus .2ex}%
                                     {\normalfont\normalsize\bfseries}}

You can change the \Large and \bfseries commands to \normalsize and possibly \itshape if you need.

Chapters will probably be trickier. In the standard report class, the \@makechapterhead command looks like

Code: Select all

\def\@makechapterhead#1{%
  \vspace*{50\p@}%
  {\parindent \z@ \raggedright \normalfont
    \ifnum \c@secnumdepth >\m@ne
        \huge\bfseries \@chapapp\space \thechapter
        \par\nobreak
        \vskip 20\p@
    \fi
    \interlinepenalty\@M
    \Huge \bfseries #1\par\nobreak
    \vskip 40\p@
  }}

You can redefine this in your own. For example, the document class I used for my dissertation (at another university!) declares this as,

Code: Select all

\renewcommand{\@makechapterhead}[1]{    % Heading for \chapter command
  \vspace*{30\p@}                       % Space at top of text page.
  \begin{center}\large\bfseries
    \ifnum \c@secnumdepth >\m@ne
      \MakeUppercase\@chapapp\ \thechapter % 'CHAPTER' and number.
      \par\nobreak
    \fi
  \addvspace{\topskip}
  \MakeUppercase{#1}
  \end{center}
  \par\nobreak                          % TeX penalty to prevent page break.
  \vskip 24\p@                          % Space between title and text.
  }

Whether this type of fix will work for you is dependent on your formatting specifications and how the command is designed to print its argument now, but this is the type of thing you'll need to modify.

[rehoot]

If the suggestions above do not work, be sure to specify which document class you are using (on the first line of your .tex file).

[alarswilson]

I'm using the report style. I'm at Princeton Theological Seminary; as far as I know I'm the only one at the whole school who even knows LaTeX exists.

I've mananged chapter titles as follows:

Code: Select all

\makeatletter
\newcommand*{\spelled}[1]{%
  \expandafter\@spelled\csname c@#1\endcsname
}
\newcommand*{\@spelled}[1]{%
  \ifcase#1\or{ONE}\or{TWO}\or{THREE}\or{FOUR}\or{FIVE}\or{SIX}\or{SEVEN}\or{Eight}\or{Nine}\or{Ten}\else\@ctrerr\fi
}
\makeatother

% Setup for headings (titlesec)
\titleformat{\chapter}[display]
{\normalfont\normalsize\filcenter\scshape}
{\normalsize\MakeUppercase{\chaptertitlename~\spelled{chapter}}}
{1pc}
{\normalsize}

I've managed to get the section title fonts to work with sectsty.

Code: Select all

% Setup for Section Headings (sectsty)
\sectionfont{\normalfont\itshape\normalsize
\subsectionfont{\normalfont\normalsize}}

What do I need to put in my preamble to get section spacing to be: 2 empty lines before (one single, + one double space); 1 empty line after (normal double space) ?

[alarswilson]

I need to maintain paragraph indents after each chapter and section title. How?

[localghost]

[...]

Chapter/Section headings:
* Chapter: Normal font size, bold, all caps
* Subheading: Normal font size, Italic
* Sub-subheading: Normal font size
* Each heading preceded by two blank lines (one doublespace, then a singlespace), and followed by a normal doublespace (one blank line), no widowed headings
* first paragraph after every heading, including chapter, must be indented .5"

Block quotes:
* first line not indented

[...]

For the headings issue just use the titlesec package and abandon sectsty. Read the package manual more careful. For a first approach see code below.

Code: Select all

\documentclass[11pt,a4paper,twoside,english]{report}
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
\usepackage[latin1]{inputenc}
\usepackage{babel}
\usepackage[doublespacing]{setspace}
\usepackage[indentfirst,raggedright]{titlesec}
\usepackage{lmodern}
\usepackage{blindtext}

\setlength{\parindent}{0.5in}
\makeatletter
\newcommand*{\spelled}[1]{%
  \expandafter\@spelled\csname c@#1\endcsname
}
\newcommand*{\@spelled}[1]{%
  \ifcase#1\or{One}\or{Two}\or{Three}\or{Four}\or{Five}\or{Six}\or{Seven}\or{Eight}\or{Nine}\or{Ten}\else\@ctrerr\fi
}
\g@addto@macro{\quote}{\upshape}
\g@addto@macro{\quotation}{\upshape}
\makeatother

% Setup for headings (titlesec)
\titleformat{\chapter}[display]
{\normalfont\normalsize\bfseries\filcenter}
{\normalsize\MakeUppercase{\chaptertitlename\ \spelled{chapter}}}
{1pc}
{\normalsize}
\titleformat*{\section}{\normalfont\normalsize\itshape}
\titleformat*{\subsection}{\normalfont\normalsize}
\titleformat*{\subsubsection}{\normalfont\normalsize}
\titleformat*{\paragraph}{\normalfont\normalsize\slshape}
\titlespacing*{\section}{0pt}{1.5\baselineskip}{\baselineskip}
\titlespacing*{\subsection}{0pt}{1.5\baselineskip}{\baselineskip}
\titlespacing*{\subsubsection}{0pt}{1.5\baselineskip}{\baselineskip}

\begin{document}
  \blinddocument

  \begin{quote}
    \blindtext
  \end{quote}
\end{document}

The quote environments get a special treatment. For more information refer to the other topic [1]. The original idea didn't work.

[1] View topic: Turabian style: quote environment


Best regards
Thorsten