12/5/2023 0 Comments M dash![]() ![]() The post–Communist era in Eastern Europe saw a reemergence of theater and the arts.Use an en dash for complex compound adjectives in place of a hyphen to provide clarity. The Detroit–Orlando flight was a quick one.The campaign manager reported he had won in a landslide, 632–234.Use an en dash for scores, votes, or directions from one place to another. The Lovington–Hobbs games were scored by officials from both towns.The teacher–teacher training was beneficial for building trust throughout the school year. ![]() ![]() Use an en dash to highlight equal partnerships or pairings. The 1861–1865 American Civil War was horrendous in terms of lives lost.Shipping usually takes 5–10 business days.We expected between 15–20 people for the spring luncheon.The Dallas–Las Vegas connection included a 3-hour layover.Communication is essential to building administrator–teacher trust.Do not use if sentence structure contains a “from … to …” or “between … and …” parallel structure. The Smith–Johnson debate was heating up before the second question was even asked.We were watching the Tiger–Ranger game on television.Use an en dash in place of the word versus. Take a look at how it is used to help highlight the relationship between particular words and numbers in a sentence. The rules for en dash use are easy to remember since it is specific to word relationships. The midsize en dash (–) is narrower than the em dash (-) but wider than a hyphen (-). What is an En Dash?Ĭalled such since the dash is supposed to be approximately the width of a typed letter N, the en dash (sometimes called en rule) shows the relationship between two words, dates, or numbers. A hyphen (-) is the shortest “dash” and connects two words. An em dash (-), the longest “dash,” is used as a substitute for a comma, colon, semi-colon, or parentheses and emphasizes information. This explanation is not intended to be exhaustive (for much more, see chapter 6 in CMOS), but I do hope that it helps to frame the different potential of each length of dash.An en dash (–), the second-longest “dash,” is used to show how a range of things in writing are related to one another. In interrupted speech, one or two em dashes may be used: “I wasn’t trying to imply-” “Then just what were you trying to do?” Also, the em dash may serve as a sort of bullet point, as in this to-do list: For example, in a bibliographic list, rather than repeating the same author over and over again, three consecutive em dashes (also known as a 3-em dash) stand in for the author’s name. Its use or misuse for this purpose is a matter of taste, and subject to the effect on the writer’s or reader’s “ear.” Em dashes also substitute for something missing. It allows, in a manner similar to parentheses, an additional thought to be added within a sentence by sort of breaking away from that sentence-as I’ve done here. Now, that is a rather fussy use of the en dash that many people ignore, preferring the hyphen. In that example, “pre” is connected to the open compound “World War II” and therefore has to do a little extra work (to bridge the space between the two words it modifies-space that cannot be besmirched by hyphens because “World War II” is a proper noun). En dashes are also used to connect a prefix to a proper open compound: for example, pre–World War II. And in fact en dashes specify any kind of range, which is why they properly appear in indexes when a range of pages is cited (e.g., 147–48). The en dash connects things that are related to each other by distance, as in the May–September issue of a magazine it’s not a May-September issue, because June, July, and August are also ostensibly included in this range. The hyphen connects two things that are intimately related, usually words that function together as a single concept or work together as a joint modifier (e.g., tie-in, toll-free call, two-thirds). I frame it this way because the work they do is roughly related to their length (though I don’t think CMOS puts it this way outright). First of all, there are three lengths of what are all more or less dashes: hyphen (-), en dash (–), and em dash (-). I will try to condense the various bits of information scattered throughout CMOS. What is the difference in usage between an em dash and an en dash?Ī. ![]()
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