OSCOLA – Abbreviations commonly used in case names

When you are using OSCOLA referencing style, please remember that you can abbreviate common words and phrases in case names, i.e. use DPP for Director of Public Prosecutions or Co for Company.

The table below provides you with examples for abbreviations commonly used in case names. It is not a comprehensive list, so for abbreviations that are not in the list, please consult Cardiff Index to Legal Abbreviations database.

TIP! In OSCOLA, abbreviations do not have full stops.

Attorney General	A-G
Anonymous	Anon
Area Health Authority	AHA
British Broadcasting Corporation	BBC
Borough Council	BC
County Council	CC
Company	Co
Commissioner/Commissioners	Comr/Comrs
Co-operative	Co-op
Corporation	Corp
Crown Prosecution Service	CPS
District Council	DC
Department	Dept
Director of Public Prosecutions	DPP
European Communities	EC
Executor	Exor
Executrix	Exrx
Health Authority	HA
Her Majesty’s	HM
Incorporated	Inc
Inland Revenue Commissioners	IRC
London Borough Council	LBC
Limited	Ltd
public limited company	plc
The Queen (or King)	R
Rural District Council	RDC
Urban District Council	UDC
Vice-Chancellor	V-C

For more information, please read the following sections of  OSCOLA user guide (4th ed.): 1.6 Tables and lists of abbreviations, 1.6.1 Lists of abbreviations, 2.1.2. Case names and 4.2 Abbreviations.

Taylor Library Team
lawlib@abdn.ac.uk

 

 

OSCOLA – Citing journal articles: The dilemma of round and square brackets

Are you working on your first written assignment this academic year and getting confused with OSCOLA citation? This post helps you clarify which brackets – (round) or [square] – you should choose when you are citing a journal article.

The general rule is that you need to use square brackets around the year if the journal you are citing uses the year rather than a consecutive number to identify the volume. Here is a relevant example:

Meghan Campbell, ‘Reigniting the dialogue: the latest use of the notwithstanding clause in Canada’ [2018] Public Law 1

If there is a separate volume number available for the publication, please, use round brackets:

Emma Lees, ‘Title by Registration: Rectification, Indemnity and Mistake and the Land Registration Act 2002’ (2013) 76 Modern Law Review 62

To help you, we created a list of journals available in our collections, which use year identification, so you need to cite them with square brackets.
NOTE that this is not a comprehensive list!!!

• Acta Juridica
• British Tax Review
• Criminal Law Review
• International Family Law
• Journal of Business Law
• Journal of Personal Injury Litigation
• Journal of Planning and Environment Law
• Lloyd’s Maritime and Commercial Law Quarterly
• Private Client Business
• Public Law

TIP! If you want to cite a forthcoming article, follow the exact same format you would with published journal articles but add ‘(forthcoming)’ following the citation. In case you do not have information about the volume or page numbers, simply omit that information.

If you want to learn more about journal citation, please read section 3.3.1 in the OSCOLA user guide for hard copy journals (page 37) and section 3.3.3 for forthcoming articles (page 38).

Don’t forget that you can also get help in Taylor Library, please visit our Help Desk from Monday to Friday between 09:00 -16.30.

Taylor Library Team
lawlib@abdn.ac.uk

 

Tip of the Day: OSCOLA -Table of cases (EU cases)

Our series of blog posts on OSCOLA aim to help you navigate through the complex and sometimes confusing rules of this referencing style. This time we concentrated on EU cases organising them in tables at the end of your work.

TIP! If you divide your table of cases by jurisdiction:

• list European Court of Justice (ECJ), General Court (GC) – previously known as Court of First Instance (CFI) – and Commission decisions separately,
• in chronological or numerical order,
• cite the cases as in footnotes, with the case number first, but omitting the
  word ‘Case’.

EU cases have been given the prefix C– (for ECJ cases) or T– (for GC cases).

Example

C-280/92 Spain v the Commission [1994] ECR I-4103
C–176/03 Commission v Council [2005] ECR I–7879
C-39/94 SFEI v La Poste [2006] ECR I-3547

T–344/99 Arne Mathisen AS v Council [2002] ECR II–2905
T-396/08 Freistaat Sachsen und Land Sachsen-Anhalt v Commission [2010] ECR II-141,
T-29/05 Deltafina v Commission [2010] ECR II-4077

Tip! If not listed separately in your table of cases, EU cases should be arranged alphabetically by first party name, followed by the case number in brackets.

Example

Cite the ‘Case T-344/99 Arne Mathisen AS v Council [2012] ECR II-2905’ in the table of cases under letter ‘A’:

• Arne Mathisen AS v Council (T-344/99) [2012] ECR II-2905

For more information, see pages 10 – 11 and 30 – 31 in the OSCOLA user guide or our library guide on OSCOLA .

Taylor Library Team
lawlib@abdn.ac.uk