VII. ITALICS

A. Italicize Latin names of plants and animals (genus and species).

Homarus americanus

B. Do not italicize

1) Scientific names for phylum, class, order, and family, but use initial caps.

Chordata, Carnivora

2) English derivatives of scientific names, and use lower case: amoeba, carnivore.

C. Italicize the specific names of ships, airplanes, and spacecraft but not the abbreviations that may precede them. Do not italicize designations of classes or makes, and do not italicize names of trains.

USS Enterprise
HMS Victory
Spirit of St. Louis
Boeing 747
Essex Class carriers
Apollo 7

D. Titles

The titles of books, CDs, catalogs, paintings, plays, movies, radio and television programs, long musical compositions, operas, pamphlets, periodicals, and Web publications (but not Web sites) should be italicized. Titles of book series, conference presentations, dissertations and theses, film series, lectures, radio and television episodes, songs, essays, lectures, parts of volumes (chapters, titles of papers, etc.), and short stories should be placed in quotation marks.

E. Emphasize words and phrases

Use italics, rather than quotes or underlining, to emphasize words in text; also to highlight foreign words or phrases not yet Anglicized.

The time to strike is now.
The stranded party mixed sawdust and flour to create an ersatz bread.