What symbols are used after difficult words in a text to refer a reader to a glossary for a definition?
What symbols used after difficult words in a text to refer a reader to a glossary for a definition?
I'm really looking for the most commonly used / accepted symbols and I am wondering whether certain symbols are specific only to particular subjects such as math / literature etc.
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If you can live with it not being after the word, my dead-trees encyclopedia which was written long before web 2.0 was all the hype uses something like the form ►someword (that's U+25BA from the Geometric Shapes Unicode block; Black right-pointing pointer) to refer specifically to other subjects found in the encyclopedia. I can't cite any real facts to support the following, but it seems to be a fairly common notation in such works.
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Usually, there are no demarcations made in the text that would tell your readers if a word is present in the glossary or not.
In cases when there is a remark about something that needs to be made, a footnote is used.
In certain cases, the footnote is not explained in the footer of the same page, rather it refers to a different section usually titled "Notes".
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For such footer symbols, the following convention is used:
If you want to explain footer at the end of the same page, start with asterisk (*) mark. If there are more than one such words on the same page, go ahead in the following order:
* , ** , *** , **** , † , ‡ , §.If you are using a "Notes" section, then you can use any symbol (preferably from the above defined list) to mark your words
In textbooks and articles, if words are to be included in a glossary (as is your question), there is no standard rule of using symbols. It is expected of the reader to have a look for and at the glossary, for words that they may find difficult.
As a suggestion you could italicize the first occurrence of words that you have included in the glossary
As an alternate, you can put an * mark next to the words (though this might distract your reader).
Another possible solution is to include a mark in a bracket. For example you could write (G) in the bracket (similar to Clayton's comment)
Hope this helps.
Addition: You can find the details about footnotes that I have referred to above at this link: http://dd.dgacm.org/editorialmanual/ed-guidelines/footnotes/footnotes_chap_09.htm
I have taken the info about the order of symbols to be used in the footnote from the above (which happens to be a chapter from "United Nations Editorial Manual").
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I used footnotes in my book (which is in English with Maltese words used occasionally throughout). Word provides footnotes with ease. You can also make a glossary automatically.
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