To prep for the fact-check, SAPIENS needs an annotated draft from you once most structural edits are finalized. Annotations can be inserted into the body of the essay as footnotes or comment bubbles and will be removed before the piece is published. Any sources that you want readers to see in the published story—such as peer-reviewed studies you are citing of interest to a general reader, a news article about an event or topic you are highlighting, or a quote from a book or article—should be added as hyperlinks on 3–5 words directly in the text. The final decision on links will rest with the editorial staff.
While we prefer open-source materials, the goal is to find the best source that can substantiate claims made in the piece.
All factual elements will be checked, such as ages, names, dates, written or recorded quotes [except from author’s own interviews], numbers, and other similar content.
All claims or statements reporting on information from someone other than you, the author, will be checked and confirmed.
For the annotations, please include:
- Author or organization’s name, title of source, date, page/page range. If you repeat a source, rather than using Ibid., please use the lead author’s last name, the date, and the main source title (magazine or journal title, or book title) in follow-up annotations.
- If your source is long (an entire book, video, or the like), please add provide the page/page ranges or timestamp either in a comment bubble or a footnote. If possible, it’s also helpful to highlight the relevant passage(s) in the text.
Provide all source materials that aren’t available through an open access hyperlink. Email or place in a folder we can access (e.g., on a Google drive) all sources: PDFs, screenshots of relevant pages, transcripts, or other documents. If the sources are in another language, direct us to and translate into English the relevant passages.
Reliable Sources:
- Research studies (including ethnographic ones), reviews, or meta-analyses
- Fact sheets from credible primary sources (not press releases)
- Audio or video clips
- Official transcripts
- Direct, authoritative insights based on the author’s own ethnographic research
- Trustworthy news outlets (e.g., The Guardian, AP, NPR)
- NOTE: Wikipedia and other encyclopedias should never be relied upon as a direct source—such resources should only be used for background and context or to find authoritative sources. Do not link to these in your essay.
- NOTE: Many government sites in the U.S. have been taken down, replaced, or otherwise amended under the Trump administration. Double-check any information you use from these sites against authoritative sources.
Incorporating Fieldwork Data as Sources: As we explain in our Public Writing Training Modules: “We recognize that many anthropologists might be wary of fact-checking approaches that consider empirical data from Western scientific research to be the only valid and universal truths. … At SAPIENS, we consider a wide range of evidence to be valid.”
To help readers understand where your fieldwork information comes from, clarify in your essay when you are relying on insights gained from interviews, participant observation, et cetera.
For example:
- “From my interviews and observations from living with community members for three years, I learned …”
- “As Sheila said to me in an interview in 2008 …”
Importance: Your fact-checking resources help streamline the editing and fact-checking process. In addition, they aid us in ensuring that all our content is accurate and not plagiarized (including being self-plagiarized, which means recycling your own content rather than offering fresh writing). It also keeps you—and us—from getting into personal or legal trouble!
EXAMPLES:
