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Ensign article citations

12 postsstarted by rkirvine 7,580 viewsoriginal topic

rkirvine
New Member
#1
Is there any way to find out what page numbers Ensign articles were on in the hard copy? I know in the older version of lds.org a proper bibliography citation was included with each article on the website. Where do I go now for this information?
aebrown
Community Administrator
#2
rkirvine wrote:Is there any way to find out what page numbers Ensign articles were on in the hard copy? I know in the older version of lds.org a proper bibliography citation was included with each article on the website. Where do I go now for this information?
You can always download the article (using the download link located near the top of the article, just under the title and author). Choose the PDF option and then you'll see the page numbers from the actual magazine.
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rkirvine
New Member
#3
I'm only getting an MP3 audio option for the download button.
russellhltn
Community Administrator
#4
You might want to check into current practices for citations. In this electronic era, I'm not sure as page numbers are a relevant as they used to be. Perhaps a different format is a better fit for what you're looking for.
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aebrown
Community Administrator
#5
russellhltn wrote:You might want to check into current practices for citations. In this electronic era, I'm not sure as page numbers are a relevant as they used to be. Perhaps a different format is a better fit for what you're looking for.
One source of guidance for current practices for citing Ensign articles is recent conference talks. For example, in the talk The Healing Ointment of Forgiveness, reference #2 has the following format:

2. Russell M. Nelson, “Listen to Learn,” Ensign, May 1991, 23.

So at least the Church does still use page numbers.
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aebrown
Community Administrator
#6
rkirvine wrote:I'm only getting an MP3 audio option for the download button.
It would be easier to give you specific help if you shared a link to the Ensign article you are trying to cite. I've sampled a dozen articles in different issues, and every one has a PDF option.

But another option would be to go to the page for the entire issue (for example, the February 2016 issue). There you can download the entire PDF (by clicking the Download link to the right of the issue date in the gray header) or individual articles. In each case, the link in the TEXT section of the download popup will give you a PDF.
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rkirvine
New Member
#7
Some of the articles are as old as 2000. Here is one, for example:
https://www.lds.org/ensign/2000/11/the- ... y?lang=eng
russellhltn
Community Administrator
#8
aebrown wrote:So at least the Church does still use page numbers.
Given the age of the talk, it might have been retrieved via hardcopy.

I question if page numbers should be used for something retrieved electronically instead of from the hard copy. There's always a possibility the two could be different. (Perhaps a late correction.) I believe Internet citations have a different format. There's a whole category of academia that deals with citations. It might be wise to check with them.
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aebrown
Community Administrator
#9
rkirvine wrote:Some of the articles are as old as 2000. Here is one, for example:
https://www.lds.org/ensign/2000/11/the- ... y?lang=eng
It appears that this article just missed the cutoff -- the PDF images seem to start in January 2001; prior to that, your only text options seem to be viewing articles that are not formatted as in the print version.

I found a previous discussion of this same issue on the forum from a couple of years ago, which basically reached the same conclusion.
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sbradshaw
Community Moderators
#10
I think 2001 is when the Church started using PDFs for Church magazines.
Samuel Bradshaw • If you desire to serve God, you are called to the work.
ahallam
New Member
#11
But as I have said in this forum for a number of years, the church could easily go back in the online versions of the talks in the Ensign before 2001 and add the page numbers.
The numbers used to listed in the html versions of the talks (at least the starting page).
That is how I got page numbers for talks that were before 2001 and not in pdf form.
With one of the updates they went away.
For a while you could still get them by going to the josephsmith.org version of magazines, but that link eventually went away.
I wish someone from the church publication site would at least address this issue.
The church magazines themselves almost always use the printed copy page numbers when referring to previous conference talks.
ahallam
New Member
#12
The church itself clearly uses the printed page number citations as evidenced by this from on online lesson manual.

Background Reading
“The Living Christ: The Testimony of the Apostles,” Ensign or Liahona, Apr. 2000, 2–3.

https://www.lds.org/manual/jesus-christ ... ing-christ?