General Uses of Parentheses in Scholarly Writing

英译中：邱敦莲

Generally speaking, parentheses or round brackets tend to appear in scholarly writing more frequently than other brackets do. They have a number of specialised uses (in mathematical equations, for instance, or textual studies), but my focus here is on the uses of parentheses in a wide range of academic and scientific writing.

一般来说，科学写作中圆括号会比其他括号用得多。括号有很多种专门的用法，如在数据公式中或者文本研究中。这里，我要说的是括号在学术写作或者科技写作中的用法。

A common use of parentheses in the running text of scholarly prose is to enclose parenthetical material, specifically information that is not as closely related to the rest of the sentence as parenthetical material set off by commas, en rules or em rules is. ‘The original version of the text (written almost two decades earlier) did not contain this passage’ provides an example of correct usage.

在学术散文的文本中，括号常用于补充材料，特别是与句子的其他部分没有密切关联性的内容。例如，“(大约20年前撰写的)文本的原始版本中没有这一段”。

Glosses, translations or bits of text in a foreign language can be enclosed within parentheses to provide more information for the reader, as is the case in ‘joie de vivre (joy of living)’ and ‘his words were “sed noli modo (but not now)”.’ Please note that when a title is translated in this way, any special font used on the title (such as italics) should be used for the translation as well.

词汇、翻译或者其他语言的文本都可以放在括号在，以便为读者提供更多的信息。

例如：‘joie de vivre (joy of living)’ and ‘his words were “sed noli modo (but not now)”.’要注意的是，当这样翻译标题时，如果标题用特别的字体(如斜体),翻译的文本也要用同样的字体。

Parentheses are often used to enclose explanations, alternative spellings and other supplementary information, as they are in the following examples: ‘the correct form is “programme” in British English (but “program” for computer software)’ and ‘much of the manuscript (late fifteenth century) appears to have been written by female scribes.’

括号常常用于提供解释和给出另外的拼写形式以及其他补充信息。

例如：

“英式英语的正确写法是‘Programme’(指计算机软件程序时用"program")”,

“(15世纪)很多稿件似乎是由女性抄写员撰写的”。

Parentheses are also used when introducing and defining abbreviations of various kinds, as in ‘participants who completed Questionnaire 2 (Group Q2)’ and ‘American Medical Association (AMA).’ The full term usually comes first, but the order can be reversed – ‘AMA (American Medical Association)’ – which is handy for referencing because the abbreviation can be cited in the main text and then precede the full version in the reference list, which makes finding an abbreviated source straightforward for readers.

在介绍各种类型的缩写的时候也常常使用括号。

例如：

“在完成问卷2的参与者(Group Q2)中”

“美国医疗协会(AMA)”。

一般来说，全名放在前面，缩写放在全名的全面，用括号括起来，但也有相反的情况,将全称和缩写颠倒，写成这样，“AMA(美国医疗协会)”。这样是便于后面引用，因为缩写可以在正文中使用，同时，将全名放在参考列表中，这样便于读者直接找到缩写的原文。

Dates, publication information, issue numbers and other aspects of full bibliographical references in both lists and notes are in some styles enclosed in parentheses. Parentheses are also used in running text to enclose in-text references in author–date systems of referencing: ‘(Bennett, 2006; Vanhoof, 2010).’

在参考文献列表和注释时，日期，出版信息，期号，以及其他目录信息往往都放在括号里。在正文中也将引文的作者和日期放在括号里，如‘(Bennett, 2006; Vanhoof, 2010).’

Parentheses often surround the item numbers in lists, particularly if a list is presented in running text as the following list is: ‘Four conditions were considered in the trial: (1) darkness inside, (2) darkness outside, (3) artificial lighting inside and (4) daylight outside.’ In such cases, a pair of parentheses enclosing each number is preferable to a single closing parenthesis after each number.

括号也在列举时使用，特别是在文本中，如：“本试验考虑四个条件：(1)室内黑暗；(2)室外黑暗；(3)室内人工增光；(4)室外人工增光”。在这种情况下，在数字前后使用括号“()”比只在数字后中加单边括号“)”要好。

Tables and figures can contain a variety of information in parentheses, which are particularly effective for separating different measurements and kinds of data (such as number and percentage), even within the narrow column of a table: ‘34(50%)’ in one row, for example, ‘17(25%)’ in the next and ‘17(25%)’ in another.

表格和图用括号提供不同的信息，在区别不同的度量形式和不同类型的数据(如数字和百分数)时特别有效,在表的某一列较窄时可以采用这种方法，如第一行用‘34(50%),第二行用‘17(25%)’,第三列用‘17(25%)’.

Keep in mind when you are using parentheses that most parenthetical material needs to correspond with what has immediately preceded it in terms of both content and grammar. For instance, 34 participants and 50% of the sample are equivalent in my last example above, and ‘in that year (1996)’ is appropriate and correct, but ‘in that year (1996–1999)’ is not.

记住：在使用括号的时候，括号里面的补充信息必须在内容和语法上都要与前面的内容相响应.例如，“在我上面提到的最后一个例子中，34个参与者相当于50%的样本。用'这一年(1996)'这种形式是正确的，但是用'这一年(1996-1999)'这种形式却是不恰当的。”

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