How to Create Italic Text in LaTeX: A Beginner‘s Guide – TheLinuxCode (2024)

Italicized text is a key tool for adding emphasis in documents. But how exactly do you make text italic when using LaTeX?

In this comprehensive guide, you‘ll learn:

• Multiple LaTeX commands for italicizing text
• How to italicize partial words and phrases
• Techniques for multi-paragraph italicized passages
• Combining italics with other formatting like bold
• Best practices for using italic text

By the end, you‘ll have a deep understanding of italicizing text in LaTeX!

What is Italic Text?

Before diving into LaTeX, let‘s briefly overview italic text in typography…

Italicized text is text that slants slightly to the right. Here‘s an example:

This sentence contains italicized text for emphasis.

Italics provide visual contrast against regular upright text. They allow writers to stress or highlight key words and phrases.

In typography terminology, italic text is referred to as:

• Oblique – slanted version of a font
• Emphasis – highlighting importance
• Stress – adding prominence

Italics also have other uses like defining new terms or signaling foreign words.

LaTeX provides easy ways to italicize text to achieve these typographic goals.

Why Use Italics in LaTeX?

LaTeX excels at robust text formatting, especially for scientific documents.

Italics help LaTeX authors:

• Emphasize key points – Crucial in technical writing for stressing key information
• Define new terms – Italicize at first mention for reader clarity
• Label variables – Used in equations and math for symbols
• Cite works – Italicize book, film, and publication titles per style guides
• Mark foreign terms – Set off non-English words used in text

Used well, italic text enhances LaTeX documents. But it should be used in moderation.

"Effective use of italics depends on using them for specific, limited purposes." – Robert Bringhurst, The Elements of Typographic Style

With LaTeX‘s powerful typesetting, italics are easy to implement. Now let‘s see how.

LaTeX Italic Text Commands

LaTeX offers different italic text commands and environments:

Let‘s look at each method.

1. Basic \textit

The most common approach is the \textit command. To make text italic, simply wrap it in \textit{} like this:

\documentclass{article}\begin{document}Here is some \textit{italicized text} in a sentence.\end{document} 

This renders as:

Here is some italicized text in a sentence.

You can use \textit multiple times within a paragraph:

\documentclass{article}\begin{document}The \textit{quick brown fox} jumped over the \textit{lazy dog}.\end{document}

Renders as:

The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog.

Any text between \textit{ } will be italicized. This provides an easy way to emphasize words and phrases in LaTeX.

2. \emph Command

\emph is another LaTeX command for italics that works the same as \textit:

\emph{This text will be italic} 

The \emph command comes from the amsmath LaTeX package so many authors prefer it for math contexts. But in regular text, \emph and \textit are essentially identical.

Which to use? \textit is probably more common, but \emph works too. Up to your personal taste!

3. \itshape for Paragraphs

What about longer passages that need italicizing across multiple paragraphs?

For that, LaTeX has the \itshape environment. Wrap the paragraphs in \begin{itshape} and \end{itshape}:

\begin{itshape}This entire paragraph will be italicized.And this one too! As you can see, `\itshape` italicizes across multiple paragraphs.\end{itshape}

Renders as:

This entire paragraph will be italicized.

And this one too! As you can see, \itshape italicizes across multiple paragraphs.

The \itshape approach is useful for papers, books, or articles where large sections need italicizing.

Now that you know the basic LaTeX italic tools, let‘s look at some more examples and applications.

Italicizing Partial Words

Often you need to italicize only part of a word for emphasis.

To do this, just wrap the specific letters you want slanted in \textit{}:

\documentclass{article}\begin{document}She took the helic\textit{o}pter to work today.\end{document}

Renders as:

She took the helicopter to work today.

This allows you to selectively emphasize portions of words in LaTeX.

Combining Italics with Other Formatting

A powerful LaTeX capability is nesting formatting like italics within other text commands.

For example, to make text both italicized and bold, use \textit inside \textbf{}:

\textbf{\textit{This text is bold and italic}}

Renders as:

This text is bold and italic

You can combine italics with underlines, small caps, text color, and more:

{\color{blue}\underline{\textit{Blue underlined italic text}}}

Renders as:

Blue underlined italic text

The key is to first specify the outer formatting, then use \textit on the inside.

Italicizing Text in Math Mode

Text in math mode uses a different LaTeX syntax.

To italicize variables and vectors, place them within \mathit{}:

$m = \mathit{mass}, \quad \mathbf{F} = \mathit{force}$

Renders as:

$m = \mathit{mass}, \quad \mathbf{F} = \mathit{force}$

This italicizes only the variables, not the text.

For math symbols, you can use \symup for slanted symbols instead of true italic.

When Should You Use Italic Text in LaTeX?

Since italics draw attention, use them intentionally as an emphasis tool.

"Use italics sparingly, for specific purposes only." – Butterick‘s Practical Typography

Here are common use cases where italics are effective in LaTeX:

• Emphasize key points – Italicize words and phrases to stress importance
• Define new terms – Italicize at first mention, then use normally
• Introduce key concepts – Italicize on introduction to identify
• Label variables and symbols – Use in equations for clarity
• Mark foreign words and phrases – Set off non-English terms
• Cite publication titles – Per humanities style guides
• Indicate voices in writing – Like internal monologue or side conversations

Conversely, avoid overly liberal use of italics which diminishes their impact.

Here is a handy table summarizing appropriate uses of italicized text:

Use this quick guide to inform your italics usage in LaTeX documents.

Wrapping Up Italic Text in LaTeX

We‘ve covered a variety of methods for italicizing text in LaTeX:

• \textit{text} – For inline words or phrases
• \emph{text} – Alternative command
• \itshape – Multi-paragraph sections
• Nesting – Inside other formatting like \textbf
• Math mode – \mathit for variables

Italics are a useful tool for selectively emphasizing parts of your document. Use them intentionally to call out key terms and points.

LaTeX makes it easy to leverage italics for effective scientific and technical writing.

Hopefully this guide gives you the key techniques for italicized text in LaTeX. Now go accentuate your documents!

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