The Manual of Style (MOS) is one of the core article policies on Wookieepedia. It regulates the style and formatting of Wookieepedia articles and covers rules specific to Star Wars and Wookieepedia. Basic writing rules of the English language are not covered by the Manual of Style.
For rules regarding the layout of Wookieepedia articles, refer to the Layout Guide.
Perspective
In-universe
- "A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.…"
- ―The Star Wars saga's opening titles
If something is in-universe (IU), or is described as such, it belongs to the Star Wars universe rather than the real world. While characters and battles are in-universe topics, the actors who play them and the film productions in which they feature are out-of-universe. The correspondent in-universe term for the English language is Galactic Basic, the common language in the galaxy in Star Wars. In-universe articles should always be written from an in-universe perspective as if the Star Wars universe had actually existed; they should not refer to out-of-universe knowledge, such as actors or real-world media titles (e.g. Carrie Fisher or Star Wars), or lack of knowledge, such as characters who are not officially named (e.g. Instead of "An unidentified biologist visited the Agoliba-Tu system…" write "A biologist visited the Agoliba-Tu system…"). This includes infobox fields, with the exception of the name field in articles that are conjecturally titled "Unidentified," per the Layout Guide.
To maintain consistency, the prose of in-universe articles should be in past tense, per the opening titles of the Star Wars saga. Wookieepedia treats in-universe information as if they had actually occurred "a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away." Present tense may be used in headings, image captions, and quote attributions.
The exception to an in-universe perspective in an in-universe article is the "Behind the scenes" section.
Out-of-universe
Out-of-universe (OOU) is the perspective opposite of in-universe, i.e. something written from a real-life point of view. Out-of-universe articles and sections, including in-universe articles' "Behind the scenes" sections documenting the real-life development history of the topic in question, should be written in an out-of-universe perspective. This means mainly using present tense, including when describing the plot of Star Wars publications, such as "the character pursues the player in the video game," and using past tense to describe past events, such as "the video game was released by LucasArts in 2002."
Neutral point of view
In tandem with verifiability to a reliable source, all articles must be written from a neutral point of view (NPOV), presenting various perspectives fairly and without editorial bias. Both in-universe and out-of-universe articles should describe verifiable facts, including facts about opinions attributed to relevant individuals, instead of asserting opinions themselves (e.g. Instead of "Notably, the devious attack by Palpatine's evil empire…" simply write "Mon Mothma deemed the covert attack under Palpatine's dictatorship an outrage…").
If official material characterizes the Galactic Empire's rule as "evil and tyrannical," then articles should instead describe the Empire in an objective and verifiable way that is factually correct in-universe, such as "an oppressive dictatorship." Ambiguous wording such as "it was known," "it was considered," "ultimate fate is unknown," and "what happened to the ship afterward is a mystery" should be avoided. If official material use such wording quantifies who held the view, then it should be specified. If official material use such wording regarding an in-universe knowledge or lack of knowledge, then articles should document it accordingly unless the information is superseded by another source, for example stating that a character whose fate was previously described as "unknown" had died.
Wookieepedia articles should also focus on events directly relevant to the subject and avoid self-references (e.g. Instead of "There has been some debate between editors of Wookieepedia, which assumes…" simply write "This article assumes…"). If documenting the role of Wookieepedia in a subject's development history, use the phrasing "the free-to-edit, unofficial online encyclopedia named Wookieepedia" to emphasize the potential unreliability of the information on the site and clarify that it is not an official source. Avoid using lists as they present information in the form of trivia or miscellaneous facts; information relevant to the article topic should be formally presented in prose as part of a suitable article section, pursuant to the Layout Guide.
Grammar and spelling
Language
Though the readers and editors of Wookieepedia speak many varieties of English, we mandate standard American English spelling, grammar, punctuation, and word usage. This is the variety of English used in the first printings of most primary sources.
- If a word has two acceptable variants in American English, the one that is considered "more American" is to be used. Such example is the spelling of judgement as judgment. The only exception of this rule is the spelling of words ending in -ogue: while dialog is an acceptable version of dialogue, the latter is preferred.
- If a direct quotation from a British source has a word which is spelled differently in American English, the original British spelling must be preserved. However, a [sic] sign may be put after the word to indicate the text was quoted verbatim.
Units of measurement
Many official Star Wars sources use the metric system of measurement, while others use American measurement units. It is recommended that in-universe articles use the metric system, but users should avoid making measurement conversions based on real-world conversion standards. Articles may state measurements based on whichever system is used in a particular canon source. (See also List of measurement units.)
Pronouns
- All characters, including individual droids, should be referred to by their specified pronouns.
- Refer to inanimate, non-sentient objects by "it/its" pronouns, even if characters or narrative text use other pronouns (example: "The Executor fired its turbolasers" instead of "The Executor fired her turbolasers.").
- In its singular form, a droid model, as with other types of products such as starship classes, should be referred to by "it/its" pronouns (example: "The XLT-014 labor droid was a fifth-degree droid […] Instead of arms, it had two long, flat claw appendages […] Units of the model had repulsorlifts installed in their three-toed feet.").
- → See Forum:CT:New addition to Wookieepedia:Naming policy (it's about droids!) and Forum:CT:Pronouns usage
Apostrophes and possessives ending in "s"
While plural nouns ending in "s" should be made possessive by adding only an apostrophe, singular nouns ending in "s" can be made possessive by adding either an apostrophe followed by another "s" or simply an apostrophe, providing each article is consistent throughout. Users are encouraged, but not required, to use only an s' for possessive nouns ending in a Z-sound. For example, while discussing the armor of multiple Mandalorians, one would write "Mandalorians' armor"; but while discussing the armor of Darth Nihilus, one could write "Nihilus's armor" or "Nihilus' armor."
Definite articles
Refer to individual starships and space stations using the definite article (example: "The Devastator pursued the Tantive IV."), unless source material demonstrates a clear and consistent departure from this standard (example: "Home One served as Admiral Ackbar's flagship at the Battle of Endor.").
Capital letters
Headings
Capitalize the first letter only of the first word and of any proper nouns in a heading, and leave all of the other letters in lower case. Do not employ title case.
Galaxy, sector, and system
When the galaxy is linked to, it is not to be capitalized. Similarly, when naming and linking to systems and sectors, the words "system" and "sector" should remain in lower case, unless canon dictates otherwise (e.g. Corporate Sector).
Examples: Corellian sector and Corellian system
- → See Forum:CT:Capitalizing "galaxy" - arguments against, and request for revote
- → See Forum:CT:Capitalizing "sector"
Jedi and Sith
The words "Jedi" and "Sith" must always be capitalized. "Jedi" and "Sith" are metonymies that refer to "a member of the Jedi Order" and "a member of the Sith Order," respectively.
The Force
- While "the Force" is a proper noun and therefore must be capitalized, the light and dark sides of the Force are not capitalized in the vast majority of official sources. Therefore, they must not be capitalized on Wookieepedia. For example: "Anakin Skywalker fell to the dark side," not "...to the Dark Side."
- This does not apply if force refers to any other meanings of the word: A strike force of stormtroopers entered the system, not A strike Force...
Rebel and Imperial
- If the adjective "Imperial" is referring to the Galactic Empire, it should always be capitalized, e.g. "The Imperial base on Kejim was..." When "Rebel" is used independently, it should only be capitalized when referring to the Rebel Alliance of the Star Wars Legends continuity.
- However, note that if the referent of these forms are not either of these organizations, there is no reason to capitalize: "The galaxy was in turmoil by a series of rebellions and civil wars."
Human and other sentient species
- In all sections of Canon in-universe articles, the word "human" is not to be capitalized, even though other sentient species (Twi'lek, Rodian, Wookiee, etc.) are. Note, however, that Star Wars Legends in-universe articles do capitalize the words "Human" and "Near-Human." The word "humanoid" is not to be capitalized in any in-universe article.
- → See Forum:CT:Capitalization of Human, Forum:CT:Capitalizing "human" -- some more details, and Forum:CT:Canon Human
- Semi-sentient or nonsentient creature names must not be in capitals unless dictated otherwise by canon. Hence, writing "Rancor" instead of "rancor" is agrammatical.
Ranks and titles
- Ranks and titles are to be capitalized when they immediately precede an individual's name. Do not capitalize ranks or titles when used as a substitute for the name. "As an experienced leader, Admiral Ackbar served the Rebel Alliance. The admiral later served the New Republic."
- There are some ranks the name of which should always be capitalized, no matter the semantics. Such titles are Padawan, Vice Admiral, Flight Leader, and so on.
Punctuation
Period
- Only image captions and reference notes that constitute full sentences should receive a period (full stop).
- Example: "Luke Skywalker, Jedi Knight" does not receive a full stop, whereas "Luke Skywalker was a Jedi Knight." does.
- Do not add a period (full stop) in quote template attributions.
Serial comma
Articles shall use the serial comma as standard.
Hyphens and dashes
Three types of hyphens and dashes are used on Wookieepedia: standard hyphens (-), en dashes (–), and em dashes (—).
- Use the hyphen (-) for
- Standard hyphenation of words
- Example: "well-written" and "forty-two"
- Joining ≥two words that serve as a single adjective (compound adjectives) of a noun in subject (but not when in predicate)
- Example: "state-of-the-art design" and "they opened fire on the already-disabled Star Destroyer"
- Prefixes and suffixes when appropriate
- Example: "re-evaluate"
- Standard hyphenation of words
- Use the en dash (
–) for- Ranges of dates/numbers when both ends are known
- Hyphenating compound words, such as "open-source", or word combinations, such as "Galactic Empire"
- Example: "open-source–based web browser" and "Post–Galactic Empire Era"
- Use the em dash (
—) for- Ranges of dates/numbers when one end of the range is missing
- Colon-like use
- Example: "However, it was too late—he had already fallen to the dark side."
- Parenthesis-like use
- Example: "Star Wars is—as everyone knows—amazing."
- Replacing double hyphens (--), including in quotes
Numbers
- Whole numbers between one and ninety-nine (inclusive) should be spelled out in article prose (e.g. "fifty-four," not "54"; "fifty-fourth," not "54th"). Numerals can be used for other numbers (e.g. "one-half," "3.14," "127," "five thousand," "582,797,754").
- When numbers are part of a proper noun or are otherwise presented in numerals in sources, default to numerals (e.g. 41st Elite Corps, 61st Mobile Infantry, Baktan 5000).
Formatting
Use wiki markup instead of HTML tags where available, unless otherwise specified. Examples include
==Section heading==instead of<h2>Section heading</h2>'''Bold text'''instead of<b>Bold text</b>.
Headings
Articles can be sectioned and sub-sectioned using headings. Adequate sectioning helps readers by breaking up the text and outlining the article, and words within headings are given greater weight in search results.
- Do not use level 1 headings (
= =) within articles. These are reserved for the page title. Level 2–6 headings are available for article sectioning. - Use proper heading wiki markup (
== ==), not bold markup (''' '''), to produce headings. A table of contents will then be automatically generated from the headings in an article.
Emphasis
Subject name
- The name of the article should be bolded in its first usage in the article's text, as should any alternate formal names and nicknames mentioned in the article's text (or in its introduction, if present).
- Example (from Ben Solo): "Ben Solo was a human male Force-sensitive who fell to the dark side of the Force as Kylo Ren, master of the Knights of Ren and eventual Supreme Leader of the First Order."
- Articles with conjectural titles may, but do not need to, bold the complete article title.
- Example (from Snoke's ring): "A gold ring was owned by Supreme Leader Snoke of the First Order, who wore it on the index finger of his left hand."
- Example (from First Supreme Chancellor): "Upon the foundation of the Galactic Republic in 25,053 BBY, a being served as its first Supreme Chancellor.
- Articles with obviously conjectural titles—particularly those that include "Unidentified" in the title—should not bold the complete article title.
- Example (from Unidentified admiral (Vallt's sector)): "An individual served as an admiral within the naval branch of the Galactic Republic during the Clone Wars between the Republic and the Confederacy of Independent Systems."
Individual starships and space stations
- Names of individual starships are capitalized and italicized (example: Millennium Falcon), unless source material explicitly differentiates (example: Ship, the Sith Meditation Sphere).
- Names of space stations are italicized or not, according to formatting in source material (examples: Death Star, Tarkin, the Wheel).
Starship and vehicle classes
In certain situations, Star Wars canon and Star Wars Legends follow different formatting standards for starship classes. Adhere to the following, noting any differences between Canon and Legends:
- When used as a compound adjective, the name of the ship class is italicized and hyphenated.
- Canon: "Several CR-ninety corvettes, two Carrack-class light cruisers, a couple of Victories, and a Venator-class destroyer–the Liberator." (Tarkin, pg. 149)
- Certain exceptions apply in accordance with source material formatting (example: qaz-class Star Destroyer).
- Legends: "Embodying Emperor Palpatine's power and ruthlessness, the Imperial-class Star Destroyer came to symbolize the Empire during the Galactic Civil War." (The Essential Guide to Warfare, pg. 117)
- Canon: "Several CR-ninety corvettes, two Carrack-class light cruisers, a couple of Victories, and a Venator-class destroyer–the Liberator." (Tarkin, pg. 149)
- When used as a compound noun, the name of the ship class is italicized. In Canon, the term is hyphenated; in Legends, it is not hyphenated.
- Canon: "The Resistance has limited intelligence of the First Order fleet, and many fear that the Resurgent-class is not the largest of the new Star Destroyer designs." (Star Wars: The Force Awakens: The Visual Dictionary, pg. 43)
- Legends: "...while a trio of six-hundred-meter cruisers—the Enforcer, Interdictor, and Vindicator classes—were common sights on the galaxy's star lanes." (The Essential Guide to Warfare, pg. 117)
- When used as a noun without the accompanying term "class," the name of the ship class is not italicized.
- Canon: "Are any of the Venators within range?" (Catalyst: A Rogue One Novel, pg. 287)
- Legends: "...including Imperial Star Destroyers, Venators, and a handful of Lucrehulks." (The Essential Guide to Warfare, pg. 119)
- Starfighter and vehicle classes shall adhere to the preceding rules as appropriate in accordance with source material formatting respective to each continuity (examples: Nantex-class territorial defense starfighter, Seraph-class urban landspeeder).
Comic books
Do not italicize the issue numbers of individual comic books (examples: Legacy 18, Marvel Comics 1000, Doctor Aphra (2016) 38, Star Wars Adventures (2017) 28).
Punctuation
- To easily distinguish between hyphens and dashes in the editing interface, create em dashes and en dashes by typing "
—" and "–", not—and–, respectively, with the exception of em and en dashes that occur within wikilinks to Wookieepedia articles with dashes in their title. For such links and their appropriate pipelink formatting, the—and–characters should be used directly as provided by link autosuggestion.
- Articles shall avoid "smart" (also known as "typographic" or "curly") quotation marks and apostrophes by converting them to ASCII (also known as "neutral" or "straight") quotation marks and apostrophes. In other words, quotation marks and apostrophes on Wookieepedia should look like '...' and "...", not ‘...’ and “...”.
- For ellipses, use "
…" rather than "...".
White space
No artificial white spaces are to be added to mainspace articles.
Comic and magazine issues
- When mentioning individual issues of comic book series that include the series' initial publication year as a parenthetical descriptor in the article title, the year parenthetical should be included, in the following format: Doctor Aphra (2020) 12. This applies to all articles' reference notes; in-universe articles' "Appearances" section; and out-of-universe articles' "Bibliography" and "Sources" sections.
- When mentioning individual issues of comic book series or magazines with an issue number in the article prose (such as in-universe articles' "Behind the scenes" section and out-of-universe articles' "Biography" section), articles may specify the issue number independent of the series title (e.g. "the twenty-second issue of the Star Wars: Darth Vader comic series"; "issue 0 of Dark Horse Comics' Star Wars: Tales of the Jedi — The Golden Age of the Sith mini-series"; "issue 131 of the magazine The Official Star Wars Fact File").
- For one-shot comics with issue numbers, such as Age of Rebellion - Boba Fett 1 and War of the Bounty Hunters – Boushh 1, the full comic title should be given and specified to be a one-shot comic (e.g. "the one-shot comic Age of Rebellion - Boba Fett 1").
Scroll box
When using the {{Scroll box}} template for multiple entries, the closing braces of the template should be listed on their own line after the final entry for readability. An exception to this rule is the wrapping of scroll boxes around {{Reflist}}, which can be listed on a single line.
Citations
Relevant policy: Wookieepedia:Sourcing
Quotes
To supplement the article content, quotes may be added as part of the prose or using quote templates.
For rules regarding the placement of quote templates, refer to the Quotes section of the Layout Guide.
Allowable quotes
A quote used in a Wookieepedia article should only include:
- Text that is presented within actual quotation marks, or otherwise clearly marked as spoken dialogue.
- Text that is clearly presented within the confines of someone's memoirs, journal, or diary. This includes in-universe written works, such as catalogs, news reports, historical chronicles, government documents, personnel dossiers, and the like.
- A quote is NOT:
- Narrative prose that is not actual spoken dialogue or a character's personal memoirs, journal, or diary. This means that thoughts are not considered quotable material.
A quote used in the "Behind the scenes" section of an in-universe article (or anywhere, in an entirely out-of-universe article) may contain any properly cited and formatted text required to supplement the information presented in that section and is not subject to the preceding content restrictions. Such a quote may include any text content relevant to Wookieepedia's areas of interest and relevant to the article text it accompanies. Quotes including narrative text and thoughts, specifically, should be reserved strictly for illustrative purposes and not for general use. Quotes with this kind of otherwise prohibited content may not be used outside of an out-of-universe section or article.
Formatting
- Users should not correct the capitalization, spelling, grammar, or word usage within direct quotes taken from copyrighted sources as such modifications jeopardize our Fair use claim on that material. Quotes should be verbatim and any changes, edits, or exclusions should be explicitly noted by using square brackets ("[]"). Any errors made by the author may be noted by using "[sic]." This includes words such as Human, which is capitalized in Star Wars Legends, and the word galaxy, which is to be decapitalized in all other contexts. However, the below changes may be made without being noted:
- For emphasis, use italics instead of emphasized boldfaced wording. In quote templates, emphasis is achieved by removing italics.
- Per the Dash policy, replace double hyphens (
--) with emdashes (—)
- Per standards of American English, double quotation marks (" ") should be used and the period (full stop), comma, question and exclamation marks should be within the quotation marks.
- For quotes inside quotes, use single quotation marks (' '): "I never liked 'May the Force be with you.'"
- For quotes with one or two speakers, use {{Quote}}. For quotes with more than two speakers, use {{Dialogue}}.
- Quotes should be sourced using standard references.
- → See Forum:CT:Quotes and Wookieepedia:Mofferences/January 6, 2019
- → See Forum:CT:LG and MOS Quotes update
Examples
For formatting help, refer to the template documentation pages.
Within prose
From Dromund Kaas operation:
- The Emperor's pain and anger led him to issue crazed and conflicting commands to his children, such as "freeze the oceans of Manaan" and "set fire to Ord Mantell."
Single speaker template
From Onager-class Star Destroyer:
- "Should the Empire abandon theatrics, it could build a thousand small cannons for the cost of a single 'planet-killer.'"
- ―Haxen Delto, in a report to General Airen Cracken referencing the Onager-class Star Destroyer
Two speakers template
From Anakin Skywalker/Legends:
- "Obi-Wan never told you what happened to your father."
"He told me enough! He told me you killed him."
"No. I am your father." - ―Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker
Three speakers template
From Darth Zannah/Legends:
- Darovit: "Is something wrong? What is it?"
- Zannah: "We were followed."
- Bane: "Inside the fortress. The Jedi have found us."
- ―Darovit, Darth Zannah, and Darth Bane[3]
Linking
General rules
- A subject should be linked once upon its first mention in
- The article infobox
- The article introduction
- The article body
- A table in the article body
- Individual references
- Furthermore, subjects not linked elsewhere in the article (excluding references) may be linked in
- Quote template attributions
- Image captions
- However, do not include links in
- The bolded mention(s) of the name(s) of an article's subject at the beginning of the article's text
- Section headings
- Dialogue in quote templates
- The first instance(s) of an article subject's name(s) in the article body
- Articles within a specific continuity should only link to other articles within that continuity (example: [[Yoda]] should not link to [[Yoda's species/Legends]]). The only exceptions to this are:
- The article's {{Top}} template
- Disambiguation templates
- The article's "Behind the scenes" section
- Articles should avoid redirecting links by correcting these links to point to an article's actual title (example: [[Alliance to Restore the Republic|Rebel Alliance]], not [[Rebel Alliance]]).
- Articles should avoid linking to disambiguation pages, with the exception of disambiguation and redirection templates.
- In-universe articles should not link to real-world Wikipedia articles, except in the "Behind the scenes" section.
Formatting
- Always capitalize pipelinks (example: [[Star system|system]], not [[star system|system]]).
- When pipelinking, always place all characters inside the link brackets. Examples:
- Italics: [[Subjugator (Imperial II-class)|''Subjugator'']], not ''[[Subjugator (Imperial II-class)|Subjugator]]''
- Possessives: [[Anakin Skywalker|Darth Vader's]], not [[Anakin Skywalker|Darth Vader]]'s
- Plurals: [[Galactic Empire|Imperials]], not [[Galactic Empire|Imperial]]s
- Prefixes and suffixes: [[Death|killing]], not [[Death|kill]]ing; [[Water|underwater]], not under[[water]]
- Do not place grammatical articles (such as a, an, and the) in pipelinks (example: the [[Battle of Endor|battle]], not [[Battle of Endor|the battle]]).
- Avoid unnecessary pipelinks that do not point to a different title from the term being linked (example: [[Luke Skywalker]]'s, not [[Luke Skywalker|Luke Skywalker's]]).
- Do not separate compound terms upon first linking instance (examples: [[Battle of Hoth]], not [[Battle of Hoth|Battle of]] [[Hoth]]; [[YT-1300 light freighter]], not [[YT-1300 light freighter|YT-1300]] [[light freighter]]).
- However, individual parts of compound terms may be linked upon subsequent mentions (example: YT-1300 [[light freighter]] is appropriate if [[YT-1300 light freighter]] has been linked previously).
- But do not link individual words within proper compound nouns (examples: [[Death]] [[Star]], [[Color|Azure]] [[Dianoga]] [[Cantina]], [[The galaxy|Galactic]] Empire, ''[[Bantha]]''-class assault shuttle)
- Multi-word terms or phrases within proper compound nouns may be linked if the term or phrase is not mentioned elsewhere in the article (example Imperial-class [[Star Destroyer]])
- However, individual parts of compound terms may be linked upon subsequent mentions (example: YT-1300 [[light freighter]] is appropriate if [[YT-1300 light freighter]] has been linked previously).
- When linking to Wikipedia articles or pages on other Fandom wikis, use the appropriate pipelinking parsers (examples: [[Wikipedia:Indiana Jones|Indiana Jones]], [[W:c:swg:Portable Deep Fryer|Portable Deep Fryer]]).
- Because the
#character is used by the software to link to HTML anchors (i.e. section headings), it cannot be used in article titles or in links. To account for this, pipelinks can be used: [[HoloNet News Vol. 531 52|''HoloNet News Vol. 531 #52'']].