Aaag Writing Style

---
name: aaag-writing-style
description: Use when drafting or polishing the prose of an Annals of the American Association of Geographers manuscript — Chicago Manual of Style (author-date), the 11,000-word inclusive cap, the 3-5 italicized keywords, and writing that reads as geography for a broad disciplinary audience. Polishes prose and format; it does not generate findings.
---

# Writing Style (aaag-writing-style)

The Annals reaches the **whole discipline of geography** across four areas. The prose must make a
specialist contribution legible to geographers outside the subfield, follow **Chicago Manual of Style
(author-date)**, and fit a cap that counts almost everything (检索于 2026-06；以官网为准).

## When to trigger

- Drafting the introduction, framing the contribution, or final language polish
- Cutting to the word cap, or fixing citation/keyword/format issues
- A reviewer said the paper is "hard to follow," "jargon-heavy," or "reads as [another discipline]"

## House style (verify on the Style Sheet)

- **Chicago Manual of Style, author-date** citations and reference list.
- **Abstract** followed by **3-5 keywords**, alphabetized and **italicized** at the end of the abstract.
- **Word cap: ≤ 11,000 words for Articles, *including* abstract, references, notes, tables, and figure
  captions** — budget the whole document, not just the body. Forums and Commentaries differ (see
  `aaag-submission`).
- US/standard academic English; define area-specific jargon for a general-geography reader.

## The introduction arc (make it read as geography)

Aim for: **question → geographic stake (space/place/scale/environment-society) → why it is hard →
setting & design → headline finding with mechanism → portable contribution → brief roadmap.** By the
end of the introduction a geographer in another area should know the question, the argument, the
evidence, and why it matters to geography broadly.

- **Lead with the geographic question and argument**, not the method or the study area description.
- **State the contribution early** and as a portable geographic claim (`aaag-theory-building`).
- **Name the place/scale** as part of the argument, not as throat-clearing description.

## Cross-area legibility

- Translate sub-field jargon: a Physical-Geography reader should follow a Human-Geography paper's stakes and vice versa.
- Keep methods proportionate — enough to judge rigor, not a tutorial that crowds out the argument.
- Use signposting sparingly; let the argument, not a seven-section roadmap, carry the reader.

## Trimming to the inclusive cap

- Count abstract, notes, tables, and captions; cut the longest table and the most redundant figure first.
- Move secondary detail to supplementary material rather than padding the body.
- Replace literature dumps with positioned claims (`aaag-literature-positioning`).

## Calibration anchors

- **A geographer in another area is your reader.** If a physical geographer cannot follow a human-
  geography paper's stakes (or vice versa), the framing is too inside-baseball.
- **The cap counts almost everything.** Abstract, notes, tables, and figure captions are inside the
  11,000 words — a "10,000-word body" can still be over.
- **Place is argument, not scenery.** Naming the study area is not the same as showing why this place,
  scale, or region is constitutive of the claim.

## Checklist

- [ ] Chicago author-date throughout; reference list consistent
- [ ] Abstract + 3-5 italicized, alphabetized keywords
- [ ] Whole document (incl. notes/tables/captions/refs) within the cap for the article type
- [ ] Introduction states question, geographic stake, finding, and portable contribution early
- [ ] Jargon defined for a general-geography reader; methods proportionate

## Anti-patterns

- Leading with the study-area description or the estimator instead of the question and argument
- Treating the cap as body-only and overrunning once captions/notes/refs are counted
- Mixed or non-Chicago citation style; missing or non-italicized keywords
- Sub-field jargon left undefined so other-area geographers cannot follow
- Over-signposted roadmap doing the work the argument should do

## Output format

```
【Citation style】Chicago author-date consistent? [Y/N]
【Abstract + keywords】3-5 italicized, alphabetized? [Y/N]
【Word count】total incl. notes/tables/captions/refs vs. cap
【Intro arc】question → stake → finding → portable contribution early? [Y/N]
【Cross-area legibility】jargon defined; reads as geography? [Y/N]
【Next】aaag-transparency-and-data
```

## Supplementary resources

- [`../../resources/worked-examples/01-introduction.md`](../../resources/worked-examples/01-introduction.md) — before→after Annals-style introduction
- [`../../resources/official-source-map.md`](../../resources/official-source-map.md) — Style Sheet, keyword, and word-cap facts