Punctuation Part 4

Dash it all!

 

This time we're looking at dashes, hyphens, parentheses (round brackets) and anything else that doesn't have dots or hasn't already been covered.

Right, now I want you to become a dash hound.

What him? Well of course, although some people call him a dash hound in fact he couldn't dash too quickly if his life depended on it. With those little legs? Oh come on! 

And anyway it's a dachshund (pronounced daks-hundt  - it means badger-dog, bred to unearth badgers). 
But - I'm waffling again. Back to business.  You know very well the kind of dash I'm talking about.

Dashes for Separating.

When two phrases have "and", "or", "but" between them but you also want to indicate a break, you use a dash. It's sharper than the ellipsis (see Part 2). Eg:

Police said the  jogger could be just a friend - or the  murderer himself.
We have to finish the job - and I think we can do it.

It can be used without "and, but, or" as well:

There wasn't anything glamorous about her - she was just a typist in Charlie's office.

Once again this could be two sentences, or you might think of using a semi-colon here, but it has a slightly different effect. A sense of suspense, expectation.

The dash is also used to indicate broken or interrupted speech:

 "I wonder if you could -"
"Anything for you, my dear."

"I don't know what's happened to - I mean, I don't know why he isn't back."

"I - I'm not sure.  He c-could be."

"Lets' just say - " she paused, closing her eyes for a moment. "Let's just say I need him."

Another use is in dates and such like: 1955-1960; March-April 1999; verses 3-6; pages 19-22.

And of course, for replacing letters in words you don't want to write in full:

Those f-ing dogs barked all night. One often sees asterisks or other symbols used in place of the dash in cases like this of course.

Dashes for enclosing

Dashes can be used to enclose a phrase within a sentence in much the same way commas sometimes are, but again, with a sharper break. Eg:

It's embarassing at the moment because everyone in the street - and I do mean everyone - has painted their house.

Did she know - or suspect - more than she was saying?

Again, as with the semi-colon, where there are already commas in the central phrase, use a dash instead of commas to separate it:

I don't believe we can change - overnight, over time, ever - our basic instincts.

Where the second dash comes at the end of a sentence, it is replaced by a period, question mark or some such:

It was lovely to hear from you - when I finally got it open!
When did you last see a doctor - any of you?

Hyphens

A hyphen is a short dash. Now most if us have used a short dash at times. No, not to catch a bus, but to join words.  Words like: tax-free, ex-husband, first-class, and so on.

1) One thing to remember here is that this is only done if the description comes before the noun it's describing. If they come after the noun it isn't neccssary:

It was a first-class performance.
The perfomance was first class.

He's a well-known author.
The artist was well known.

2) Where the two words are (-ed) type adjectives:

middle-aged, simple-minded, and so on, the rule is that it always occurs, whether before or after the noun.

Many of these are now written as one word in any case, eg: kingsized, but not if the words have two vowels in between them, eg: middleaged. That's just too confusing.

3) Most adjectives of the (-ing) type: easy-going, good-looking, etc, and many (-ed) ones :
far-fetched, home-grown, can be written as one word, or have the hyphen.

4) words whuch are made of a verb with -er or -ing,  plus an adverb, are hyphenated:

passer-by, summing-up, but if the verb doesn't end in -er or -ing, the word can be hyphenated:

break-in, follow-up, follow-through, stand-in,
but many are all one word:
breakdown, breakthrough, breakup.

5) compounds which suggest "and". Eg:

bitter-sweet, Anglo-American,  socio-economic.

6) number compounds and suchlike:

twenty-two,  four-fifths, (but note: two thousand, three million).
thirty-odd members,  a two-week-old baby, the seventy-mile-an-hour speed limit.

7) Where the first word is a single letter:

T-shirt, U-turn, X-rated, F-word, X-ray (or x-ray).

8) Some prefixes normally take a hyphen:

ex-wife,  self-appointed, half-truth, quasi-mystical, etc.

It is usual when the prefix precedes a capital letter:
un-American, anti-English, etc  (although these are increasingly being spelled without a hyphen, as all one word)
and to avoid confusion with another word. Eg:
re-form (form again) as opposed to reform ( improve)

Another difference between American and British English has been the use of hyphens to aid in pronunciation:  co-operative, pre-eminent.
This is not used in the US and is becoming less common in the UK now.

9) Two or more hyphenated words may be linked:

pro- and anti-war demonstrators, middle- or old-aged parents, mothers- or fathers-in-law.

Hyphens for word division in poetry.

Hyphens sometimes occur at the ends of lines when a word is broken up across two lines to make the lines of more equal length. This applies to prose rather than poetry of course.  Here are some general rules for doing this:

1) Where there is already a hyphen : self-perpetuating

or where a compound word is joined: micro - analysis (not microan-alysis)

2) After a prefix:

over-simplify
dis-interested

3) Avoid breaking a word where it would lead to confusion:

manu-script (not man-uscript)

shorter words: flower, woman, offer, are best left whole

4) In general, break beween consonants if possible:

elec-tron,  terres-trial, mas-sacre,  pros-perity, etc.

5) Before the ending  "ing"

writ-ing, show-ing, fall-ing, etc
unless there is a doubled consonant before the "ing""
begin-ning, permit-ting, plug-ging, etc.
However, if the word had an "le" before the "ing" was added ( chuckle, wriggle) then break before the l or even one letter before that:

chuck-ling, fond-ling, ramb-ling. puz-zling, etc.

6) Do not divide these groups of letters when they make one syllable:

-ceous,   -geous,
-cious,   -gious,   -tious,  
-cial,     -tial, 
-cian,  -cion,   -gion,   -sion,  -tion.
     

Parentheses or brackets.

These are often called brackets in British English, or round brackets.  They are used to enclose a note that would otherwise ruin the flow of the sentence.  It can be an explanation, an elaboration, an example, identification, justification, or concession, etc. Eg:

Send two observers (who can also vote) to the meeting.
Sprinkle the flour over the meat and add the garlic (cut in half), soy sauce and rosemary.
We (I assume you are with me on this) need to get things moving.
Either that or my (admittedly naive) approach was the problem.


The parentheses can contain an entire sentence with its own punctuation:

Eg: He was hanging out in Greenwich village, in an area populated by jugglers, magicians and other good-natured hustlers.  (It was obviously not real life: no drugs, no beggars, no-one living in a cardboard box.)

Minor uses of parentheses:

1) To mention an abbreviated form of something to be used later in the text:

 The gross national product (GNP) of the country...

2) to give a translation:

It cost about 11 million yen ($77,000)
A typical one weighed about 4600 lb (2086 kg)

3) References to another place in the text:

(p368), (above), (see ch 3) etc.

4) Bibliographical references or details:

In "Dear Me" (Penguin Books, 1977) Peter Ustinov has produced a controversial autobiography, crammed with uproarious stories.

5) References to location etc:

You will find this in reception (inside main entrance) and in the office (third floor).
Contact me (on 0993928) for further details.

6) In references to other works or sections of text:  (cf. Genesis, 9.26)

7) In mathematical formulas, to show groupings:
(a+b) - (c) (x-y)

Other types of bracketing

Brackets [ ] - called square brackets in the UK - are usually used to insert an editorial note to clarify a passage, add missing words, or to replace an unfamiliar expression. Sometimes when the author puts a word or phrase into italics it's useful to point that out by saying: [my italic].

Occasionally you will see [sic] in a text, which is the author's way of saying (in Latin) that it may look odd but it's a direct quote and not a misprint.

There are other types of brackets but they needn't concern us here.