Spanish Editorial Style Guide

The University of Northern Colorado’s Editorial Style Guide is the official resource for use in all nonacademic, promotional written communications including marketing materials (brochures, flyers, posters, etc.), news releases, newsletters, web pages, emails, viewbooks and other materials featuring content, narrative or text/copy.   

This Spanish Editorial Style Guide should be used in conjunction with the Editorial Style Guide for all content that is created in or translated into Spanish to ensure consistency and a cohesive, coordinated image to our key audiences and to the public. The main source of Spanish language guidance will be the Real Academia de la Lengua Española (Royal Academy of Spanish Language), as it is the main authority on Spanish language in the world.

It should be noted that style rules for Spanish language sometimes contradict the rules outlined in the Editorial Style Guide, such as those pertaining to capitalization and punctuation. If/when discrepancies in style arise when translating or creating content in Spanish, the styles prescribed in the Spanish Editorial Style Guide take precedent over those in the Editorial Style Guide.

All Spanish language translations or newly created materials in Spanish must be coordinated with, reviewed and approved by the Marketing and Communications Department’s Bilingual Communications Strategist (BCS), per UNC’s Translation Policy and Guidelines.  

General Guidelines for Translation into Spanish 

The goal of these guidelines is to help University of Northern Colorado campus partners, internal and external translators, and anyone working on UNC Spanish-language publications, marketing materials, web content and other forms of communication. 

Avoid word-for-word translation 

Avoid word-for-word translation. Try instead to convey the heart of each idea. Clarity of meaning and natural Spanish phrasing matter more than matching the word order of your original English. We do not want the appearance that Spanish-language materials read by UNC audiences were first written in English and then translated by a digital translating tool.  

Respect the audience 

UNC audiences, either internal or external, who only read Spanish should be just as effectively engaged as English-only readers. Spanish readers should not be bored by simple Spanish. Nor should they be bogged down by complex, strange or unnatural wording.  

One of the main audiences for UNC content in Spanish is a student’s support system (family, teachers, guidance counselors, mentors, etc.) who are Spanish speakers (either monolingual, bilingual or multilingual), so it is important to consider that some of the content that is translated into Spanish will be read by them.

Neutral versus regional Spanish 

When in doubt about using regional versus neutral language, aim for a non-regional Spanish, similar to what we hear in news broadcasts on major international television cable channels, such as Univisión or Telemundo or CNN Español. Avoid word choices that are closely associated only with a particular nation or region.  

Visual Parity  

When creating bilingual materials, treat your two audiences with equality. When possible, place English and Spanish content side-by side. Placing Spanish content below English can give the appearance that the Spanish-reading audience is less important.  

For publications, the cleanest, least confusing solution is to create a Spanish-only document and an English-only document.  

Titles in Spanish can differ  

Spanish titles should quickly engage reader interest. This usually involves extra time and effort to think of a workable new title in Spanish. The very best Spanish titles for important interpretive ideas are probably not exact translations of the original English titles. Since in English some words that are put together create a different meaning, in Spanish those words will need prepositions or articles. 

An example of this is the translation of UNC Tuition Promise into Promesa de Pago de Colegiatura UNC (Promise of the Payment of the Tuition Fee) 

Sentence length 

The sentences in translated content can often be longer in Spanish because there are more prepositions, pronouns, articles, conjunctions, etc. If your draft translated Spanish reads in a choppy, unnatural way, consider combining some of the short sentences to make it flow in a way more normal in Spanish prose writing. Meaning matters more than a literal word-for-word match to the English content.

Capitalization

The rules for capitalization in the Spanish language are significantly different compared to the English language.   

Days and months

Days of the week and months of the year are not capitalized in Spanish. 

Examples:

• Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday = lunes, martes, miercóles 
• January, February, March = enero, febrero, marzo

Nationality and tribal names

Nationality and tribal names are not capitalized in Spanish. 

Examples:

• French, American, Mayan = francés, americano, maya

Academic majors, minors, emphases and concentrations

Academic degrees or programs are capitalized only when referring to specific majors, minors, emphases and concentrations and only the first word is capitalized.

Examples:

• Bachelor of Arts in Music = Licenciatura en arte en música 
• Special Education: K-12 Teaching, Licensure: Special Education Generalist = Educación especial: enseñanza K-12, licencia: generalista de educación especial 

Verb forms and pronoun choice

Command verb forms

The problem: commands in English often do not carry a clear sense of the degree of formality, nor the number of persons being addressed. Spanish verbs must have these concepts embedded in the verb form.

Default for Spanish translations should be the formal command verb forms, singular rather than plural. We assume an individual is reading the publication or the outdoor wayside exhibit or the indoor exhibit.  

The second person of singular will be addressed in the informal way (tú) in marketing materials, to comply with the branding guidelines.

Some UNC signage texts ask for visitors to act safely or obey rules in nice, light-handed, often oblique terms. Experience and evaluations show that this light-handed approach is often ignored. Use clear, direct imperative verb forms in Spanish, especially for safety messages. 

You: Tú vs. Usted 

The pronoun 'you’ in English can be either singular or plural and carries few clues as to the degree of formality or familiarity of the relationship of the writer/ speaker to the reader or listener.

Based on UNC’s branding guidelines, marketing materials will use informal language to illustrate the informal and close relationships across campus.

For another kind of translations, the BCS will determine how formal the Spanish text needs to be, working with the translator requester to understand the intended audience.

Punctuation

Comma use in sequences

There is no Oxford or serial comma in Spanish. No comma is placed immediately before Y (AND) 

Example:

• Primero, segundo y tercero 

Exclamation and Question Marks to open the sentence 

Spanish interrogatory and exclamatory sentences must start with an upside down question mark and an upside down exclamation mark before the first word of the sentence.

These two symbols exist in all ASCII character sets. With either Mac or PC computers, there are always ways to include them in Spanish texts and publications. 

Examples:

• ¡Vamos osos! 
• ¿Ya te inscribiste? 

Vowels require accents 

A word in Spanish without its proper accented vowel is a misspelled word. Accents are not optional in any Spanish- language products created for UNC. There are radical differences between a word without graphic accent and the same one with it.  

Example:

• Bebes y mamas gratis vs. Bebés y mamás gratis 

Here are the links on how to write graphic accents (also called tildes or diacritic accents) on a Mac, and on a PC.  

Commonly Used Formats

Numbers

• Spell out all numbers below 100.  
• Round off metric conversions 
• Separators for decimal points, thousands places.  

Time of day

• Use the 24-hour time format (e.g., 16:00).

Date format

Correct Spanish format is day, month, year —  (DD/MM/YYY) 

• Example: 26 de octubre de 2023  

Centuries: Use Roman numerals to express centuries. Roman numerals for centuries are standard practice in the literate Spanish-speaking world.  

Tribal Names

Use the name of the group of people. Avoid using colonial terms like Native American, Mesoamerican, Indigenous, etc. Remember that demonyms for communities are not capitalized in Spanish.  

Example:

• Una tradicional celebración mixe, como una boda, incluye a muchos participantes. 

Use national names

Use the national name of a people instead of the general noun Europeans when talking about the 1500s–1800s frontier, exploration, or settlement.

Avoid using the academic term Euro-American. 

Safety and Orientation  

Bilingual signage for safety and orientation is required in public events such as commencement. 

Writing and Syntax Suggestions

Multiple (stacked) modifiers

Interpretive writing in English abounds in noun series. Series like this produce very long and involved sentences in Spanish. It is important to identify if the modifiers affect all nouns or just the first one. English syntax makes it possible to compress expressions that require more words in Spanish. In Spanish adjectives (modifiers) require to be specified.  

It is recommended to use copulative conjunctions like: y, así como, incluyendo, etc.  

Example:

• The recently graduated students, faculty and staff.  
• Incorrect: Los recién graduados alumnos, personal académico y administrativo. 
• Incorrect: Los recién graduados alumnos, personal académico y administrativo. 

Compound nouns

Although in English two nouns can create a third one, that doesn´t apply in Spanish. Always look for a more specific noun to describe the compound one and to avoid confusion.  

Example:

• Non work-study application:  
• Incorrect: Aplicación del no trabajo estudio  
• Correct: Aplicación para el programa de trabajo estudiantil no subsidiado por el gobierno. (see next example as another way to convey this discrepancy).  

Considerations for not Translating Certain Phrases/Proper Names

When there is a word or a phrase that must be kept in English (or in any other language) because it represents a concept, or it must be quoted from the original language, it will be italicized. 

Example:

• Work-study program application = Solicitud para el programa work-study 

Names of institutions and programs must be kept if the translation can be misleading. The name will be italicized. 

Example:

• First Bank = First Bank (and not: Banco Primero) 
• Western Undergraduate Exchange = Western Undergraduate Exchange (and not: Programa de Intercambio de Estudiantes Universitarios del Oeste)  

University Facilities

Do not translate building names and other places.  

Example:

• Campus Commons