"To be" itself capped?

February 4, 2021 1:31 PM

Copyeditors: Hi. In titles, per AP and others, I know forms of "to be" are capitalized. But what about the very words "to be" themselves? Example: Don't Pretend to Be Something You're Not. Do I cap the "to"? And has anyone ever heard whether this whole rule can ever apply to headlines or A-level heads within a paper?
posted by noelpratt2nd to Writing & Language (5 answers total)

Best answer: Don't Pretend to Be Something You're Not is correct headline-style capitalization. 'To' is a preposition, which isn't capitalized, even in headlines; 'Be' is a verb, which is.
posted by Beardman at 1:34 PM on February 4, 2021

Response by poster: Looked up some old wisdom of mine that I never have use for till now: I found the To is capped if an infinitive or as part of a phrasal verb. What sez anyone--? How To Get Rich gets the To capped. Isn't To Be something like that? Or Best Ways To Sleep in the Desert (infintive)?
posted by noelpratt2nd at 1:43 PM on February 4, 2021

Best answer: Yes, it's an infinitive and therefore capitalized. The AP guide even has "What I Want To Be When I Grow Up" as one of its examples in the entry on capitalizing titles.

(Note that in some other styles, such as Chicago, "to" is lowercase in titles regardless of whether it's a preposition or part of an infinitive.)
posted by Hypocrite_Lecteur at 2:07 PM on February 4, 2021 [4 favorites]

Yeah – sorry, I should've specified that I was talking about Chicago, which is basically all my clients ever use.
posted by Beardman at 2:09 PM on February 4, 2021

Best answer: A great resource for this (because despite having a whole journalism degree I still can't remember) is CapitalizeMyTitle.com. You can set it to a variety of styles - Chicago, AP, MLA, whatever.
posted by The demon that lives in the air at 3:20 PM on February 4, 2021 [7 favorites]