Post-nominal letters


Post-nominal letters, also called post-nominal initials, post-nominal titles, designatory letters, or simply post-nominals, are letters placed after a person's name to indicate that the individual holds a position, an academic degree, accreditation, an office, a military decoration, or honour, or is a member of a religious institute or fraternity. An individual may use several different sets of post-nominal letters, but in some contexts it may be customary to limit the number of sets to one or just a few. The order in which post-nominals are listed after a name is based on rules of precedence and what is appropriate for a given situation. Post-nominal letters are one of the main types of name suffix. In contrast, pre-nominal letters precede the name rather than follow it, such as addressing a physician or professor as "Dr. Smith".

List

Different awards and post-nominal letters are in use in the English-speaking countries.

Usage

Listing order

The order in which post-nominal letters are listed after a person's name is dictated by standard practice, which may vary by region and context.

In Australia

Various University Style Guides, such as: the University of Sydney Style Guide and the Australian Government Style Manual and that of the various State Governments.
Outside of any specific academic or State or Federal Government requirement, then in the following order:
  1. Those Honours promulgated by the Governor-General in the Commonwealth Government Gazette, e.g. Current National and former Imperial honours
  2. Those Honours and Appointments promulgated by a State Governor or Territory Administrator in the relevant State Government Gazette, e.g. Fellows of the Royal Society of NSW, King's Counsels.
  3. All honorary degrees included in an Australian university's Annual Report to an Australian Parliament.
  4. Fellowships and memberships of professional bodies and learned societies incorporated by a statutory instrument i.e. a Royal Charter under the Australian Crown or an Act of Parliament
  5. Parliamentary designations
  6. Foreign Honours where permitted by Australian Federal Minister for Foreign Affairs.
  7. Fellowships and memberships of other Australian Professional Institutions.
  8. Australian Qualifications, ideally with date and institution, in descending order.
  9. Foreign Professional Memberships.
  10. Foreign Qualifications.

    In Canada

The Canadian government's The Canadian Style specifies that no more than two sets of post-nominal letters should normally be given, unless all are to be given either for information or for reasons of protocol, and that these should be the two highest of different types. The types and the order in which they are given are:
  1. Distinctions conferred directly by the Crown
  2. University degrees
  3. Memberships of societies and other distinctions

    In European fraternities

Going back to the mid 17th century, today's classical European fraternities such as the German Student Corps have used post-nominal symbols and letters to allow their members to indicate their fraternity membership and honorary positions held in their signature.
File:Zirkel of Corps Altsachsen Dresden.png|thumb|The Zirkel of a German Student Corps. This symbol captures the letters "v, c, f, A", as post-nominal for that fraternity.

Order of post-nominals in the UK

Civil usage in the UK
In the United Kingdom various sources have issued guidance on the ordering of styles and titles for British citizens, including the Ministry of Justice, Debrett's and A & C Black's Titles and Forms of Address; these are generally in close agreement, with the exception of the position of MP, etc., in the listing:
  1. Bt/Bart or Esq;
  2. * In the UK, "Esq." may refer to any gentleman in place of the pre-nominal Mr or Dr;
  3. British Orders and decorations ;
  4. Crown Appointments, i.e.:
  5. University degrees:
  6. * According to Debrett's, DD, MD and MS degrees are always given; other doctorates, other medical degrees, and other divinity degrees are sometimes given; and other degrees are seldom shown, with BA and MA never used socially ;
  9. According to Debrett's and Black's: Member of Parliament, etc. ;
  10. Membership of the Armed Forces .
In addition, British citizens who have received honours from Commonwealth countries are usually given permission from the King to use the postnominals for that honour.
Academic usage in the UK
The Oxford University Style Guide and the University of Nottingham Style Guide give the alternative ordering:
  1. Civil honours
  2. Military honours
  3. KC
  4. Degrees in the order:
  5. # Bachelor's
  6. # Master's
  7. # Doctorates
  8. # Postdoctoral
  9. Diplomas
  10. Certificates
  11. Membership of academic or professional bodies
This differs from the civil ordering in that it omits appointments except for KC, includes diplomas and certificates in addition to degrees, merges medical qualifications, fellowships of learned societies, royal academicians, and membership of professional bodies into a single item, and omits membership of the armed forces.
Loughborough University gives a very similar ordering, but with "Appointments " replacing item 3 and "Higher Education awards " replacing items 4–6. This restores the Appointments section from the civil list omitted by Oxford and Nottingham, although the other differences remain.
Nottingham Trent University gives essentially the same ordering as Oxford and Nottingham, but without specifying the order in which degrees should be given. Nottingham Trent, Oxford and Loughborough recommend degree abbreviations be given in mixed case without stops between the letters, as does Cambridge. Imperial College London, however, uses all small caps for post-nominals.
Where all degrees are shown, as in university calendars, most universities will give these in ascending order. However, advice on the precise ordering varies:
  • The Oxford University Calendar Style Guide places degrees in the order: bachelor's degrees and other first degrees; master's degrees ; doctorates; higher doctorates in order of academic precedence. Degrees at the same level are ordered alphabetically by awarding institution and multiple degrees from the same institution are grouped, with position determined by the lowest degree in the grouping. Certificates and diplomas are listed after degrees. Oxford recommends giving institution names separated by a space from the degree, not enclosed in parentheses, and that degrees from the same institution be separated by spaces only, with commas between degrees from different institutions.
  • Loughborough University advises listing all higher education awards in ascending order starting from undergraduate, so MPhys would come before BCL and postgraduate certificates and diplomas would come between undergraduate and postgraduate degrees. The examples given do not include institution names.

    Order of post-nominals in the United States

In the United States, standard protocol is to list post-nominal letters in the following order:
  1. Religious institutions
  2. Theological degrees
  3. Military decorations
  4. Academic degrees
  5. Honorary degrees, honors, decorations
  6. Professional licenses, certifications and affiliations
  7. Retired uniformed service.
Active duty services personnel do not use any post-nominals other than, if applicable, Staff Corps affiliation followed by a comma and then their branch of service. Names are bracketed by the appropriate pre-nominal and post-nominal, e.g. LCDR John Q Public, MC, USN.

Etiquette for higher educational qualifications

Higher education qualifications in the UK

In the UK, it is usual to list only doctorates, degrees in medicine, and degrees in divinity. In particular, when a person has letters indicating Crown honours or decorations, only the principal degree would normally be given. The University of Oxford Style Guide advises writers: "Remember that you do not need to list all awards, degrees, memberships etc held by an individual – only those items relevant to your writing."
In an academic context, or in formal lists, all degrees may be listed in ascending order of academic status, which may not be the same as the order in which they were obtained. The Oxford style is to list qualifications by their title starting with bachelor's degrees, then master's degrees, then doctorates. Postgraduate Certificates and Diplomas are listed after doctorates, but before professional qualifications, with a similar ordering being used by other universities. In this style, foundation degrees and other sub-bachelor qualifications are not shown. An alternative style is to give all higher education qualifications, starting from undergraduate, ordered by their level rather than their title. In this style, one might list a Certificate or Diploma of Higher Education first, then foundation degrees, first degrees at bachelor level, first degrees at master level, postgraduate degrees at master level, and doctorates. In this style, postgraduate certificates and diplomas could be shown either before postgraduate degrees at master's level or before first degrees at master's level. Strictly speaking, both the Debrett's and Ministry of Justice lists only allow for the inclusion of degrees, not non-degree academic awards.
For someone with a substantive doctorate, it is usual either to give "Dr" as the title or to list their degrees post-nominally, e.g. "Dr John Smith" or "John Smith, PhD" but not "Dr John Smith, PhD". Postnominals may be used with other titles, e.g. "Mr John Smith, PhD", "Sir John Smith, PhD", or "The Rev John Smith, PhD".
In the case of a BA from Oxford, Cambridge or Dublin who proceeds to be an MA of those universities, the MA replaces the BA and thus only the MA should be listed. Oxford has said that there is no risk of confusion between their MA and "earned" MAs as the Oxford MA is denoted "MA " rather than simply MA. However, Debrett's has advised using just "MA" to describe a Cambridge Master of Arts.
Graduates from British and Irish universities sometimes add the name of the university that awarded their degree after the post-nominals for their degree, either in parentheses or not, depending on preferred style. University names are often abbreviated and sometimes given in Latin, e.g."BA, MA, PhD "; a list of abbreviations used for university names can be found at Universities in the United Kingdom#Post-nominal abbreviations. Where the same degree has been granted by more than one university, this can be shown by placing the names or abbreviations in a single bracket after the degree name, e.g. ", Mus.D., LL.D. ".
Honorary degrees, if shown, can be indicated either by "Hon" before the post-nominals for the degree or "hc" after the post-nominals, e.g. "Professor Evelyn Algernon Valentine Ebsworth CBE, PhD, MA, ScD, DCL hc, FRSC, FRSE" ; "Professor Stephen Hawking Hon.ScD, CH, CBE, FRS". The Oxford University Calendar Style Guide recommends not giving honorary degrees in post-nominals.