Dash it all!
Mar. 3rd, 2004 03:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gwynWhile I realize that no one is exactly waiting for these things, I apologize for taking so long between usage posts. It’s hard for me to concentrate on anything lately, it seems, and then I’ve been in these outplacement and job hunting things, so my mind has been on that for a long time.
I thought I’d do something relatively easy to get back in the swing of things, and concentrate on the dash. While many other punctuation marks are misused, overused, or not used enough, the poor dash is downright abused. It’s made to stand in for far too many other punctuation marks, and people don’t even know what it really is, so it hangs around, feeling worthless. (In celebration of the Firefly movie gong forward, this is the all Firefly edition.)
The most important thing to know about the dash and how to use it is: a dash is not a hyphen. When you’re talking about little lines that separate words or letters, you’re really talking about three things. 1) is the hyphen, which is a short little line most often used to separate letters, or prefixes from the main part of a compound word (anti-Alliance), and so on. 2) is the proper dash, which is used in a variety of ways, and is physically made up of two hyphens (--) or a special character in word processors and typography programs called an em dash (—). That means that this dash takes up the width of an m in whatever typeface you’re using. 3) is a highly specialized dash that’s used only in publishing, and even then mostly only in North American publishing. It’s called an en dash (the width of an n), and you’ll see it in books and magazines to represent a range in numbers (the war with the Alliance went from 2502-2504). You can't even make this one in HTML, so we won’t be worrying about silly en dashes.
Instead we’ll worry about em dashes and hyphens. I’ll save how to properly use hyphens and create compound words and such for a later date, but right now I want to emphasize that you don’t normally use a hyphen to set off whole parts of a sentence, to add emphasis, or start a list — that’s the function of the dash. (And a side note about HTML: there are many bad things about relying on Word, for example, to create a Web version of your document, most notably that it creates huge, bloated, bad files that can be difficult to read on different browsers. But another drawback is that special characters such as the formal em dash disappear and become hyphens, making your perfected creation look a lot less than perfect. Sometimes, people won’t even be able to see where your “dash” was originally, giving it the appearance of a run-on sentence. You can turn off the autotype special character function in Word, and just use the -- to reduce this problem. There’s a special command in HTML that can give you a real em dash online, but for most of us, just using it correctly in writing is a more formidable task than using HTML characters.) I'm mixing up two hyphens/special characters in this post.
So if you didn’t use the simple hyphen (-) in your formal writing, and you know you’re using either the double hyphen to indicate a dash, or a special character that’s auto formatted for you (—), and you’re all set as to how the physical manifestation of the dash looks onscreen, then how do you use in writing? Well, the first rule I’d give is: don’t overuse it. I see a lot of amateur writers who throw colons and dashes around like salt. A lot of dashes in text will end up creating a choppy effect for your reader, turning them away from your story just because they’re having a tough time following it.
You want to focus on a couple areas. First is setting off parenthetical material that really deserves an extra punch. “All the disasters that occurred when the crew was on the planet — from the five dead Alliance cops to the hole blown in Serenity’s port side to Zoe’s gunshot wound — were blamed on Jayne.” “Simon believed that River had been tortured — more importantly, he now had the information to prove it.” In both those cases, the parts of the sentence after the dash could be contained either in parentheses or on their own as sentences, but by using a dash, you can bring them into the sentence and give it an extra oomph it wouldn’t otherwise have had.
You also use a dash for setting off what are called appositives, when they contain commas. Yeah, I know, I promised no technical grammar, but that’s what they’re called; appositives are nouns that rename a nearby noun. So you’d have something like “Serenity — a Firefly class ship weighing five thousand metric tons, carrying nine crew members, and additional cargo — flies outside the boundaries of the Alliance.” In this case, Serenity is your noun, and the info after the dash (Firefly class ship) is the appositive that renames it. Now, technically, you could just use commas there, or parentheses -- most of the time, that’s pretty much what you do with appositives. But a dash does this nifty thing where it gives the reader a chance to see the importance of all those pauses created by the commas, and of course adds extra emphasis. When you use dashes in a construction like this, use them sparingly if you’re not comfy yet with the concept. It’s really easy to use them badly or incorrectly in this way if you don’t quite know what you’re looking at. (And I have no idea what Serenity weighs; please don’t write to me and lecture me about how it really weighs X, because I just made it up for a point, and I haven’t got a freaking clue about the real weight and size.)
The last thing you’ll want to use a dash for is when you’re throwing in a list, a restatement, amplifying a point, or making a dramatic shift in thought or tone. Here are some examples of all of these:
In the cabinet were all the things Simon would need for basic doctoring -- bandages, drugs, implements, and even a sterilizer.
When you think about it, it’s hard to believe Jayne has managed to live this long -- his IQ can’t possibly be larger than his shoe size, and his violent temper always gets the best of him.
There were Alliance cops everywhere Mal looked — armed to the teeth and fully licensed to kill anyone they wished to.
Kaylee dribbled the basketball around Book, dodged Mal’s outstretched hand, and made her shot -- a perfect ball right through the hoop.
So you can get a sense here that the dash isn’t so much a necessity for a sentence, but adds flavor when used judiciously. Colons could also be used in many cases, if you wanted to, but dashes have drama. You wouldn’t want to use them where it won’t add punch to the sentence: “Having Simon on board -- for his medical background -- made a lot of sense, despite his insane sister’s potential for damage.” Sound it out, using the dashes as an extra long pause, and you’ll have a good idea if the dash is right for your prose. I know I keep harping on reading things aloud, but I truly believe that for newbie writers or folks who have trouble areas in prose, sounding out your writing can solve a lot of problems if you listen to how it reads.
The last note about dashes: everyone wonders if it should be closed or open on the sides. Well, a lot of that depends on what style guide you're using, if you're using one, and what your personal preference is. Some style guides call for space on either side of the dash, as I've done throughout this post. Others want you to close it up (everywhere Mal looked--armed to the teeth). I've found that for fanfic, in HTML, the open method works better for lines breaking at a dash, so I use this most often online. In my formal writing that's not online, I close it up, unless I'm working for a client whose guidelines state otherwise. For once, it's something that's entirely your choice!
I thought I’d do something relatively easy to get back in the swing of things, and concentrate on the dash. While many other punctuation marks are misused, overused, or not used enough, the poor dash is downright abused. It’s made to stand in for far too many other punctuation marks, and people don’t even know what it really is, so it hangs around, feeling worthless. (In celebration of the Firefly movie gong forward, this is the all Firefly edition.)
The most important thing to know about the dash and how to use it is: a dash is not a hyphen. When you’re talking about little lines that separate words or letters, you’re really talking about three things. 1) is the hyphen, which is a short little line most often used to separate letters, or prefixes from the main part of a compound word (anti-Alliance), and so on. 2) is the proper dash, which is used in a variety of ways, and is physically made up of two hyphens (--) or a special character in word processors and typography programs called an em dash (—). That means that this dash takes up the width of an m in whatever typeface you’re using. 3) is a highly specialized dash that’s used only in publishing, and even then mostly only in North American publishing. It’s called an en dash (the width of an n), and you’ll see it in books and magazines to represent a range in numbers (the war with the Alliance went from 2502-2504). You can't even make this one in HTML, so we won’t be worrying about silly en dashes.
Instead we’ll worry about em dashes and hyphens. I’ll save how to properly use hyphens and create compound words and such for a later date, but right now I want to emphasize that you don’t normally use a hyphen to set off whole parts of a sentence, to add emphasis, or start a list — that’s the function of the dash. (And a side note about HTML: there are many bad things about relying on Word, for example, to create a Web version of your document, most notably that it creates huge, bloated, bad files that can be difficult to read on different browsers. But another drawback is that special characters such as the formal em dash disappear and become hyphens, making your perfected creation look a lot less than perfect. Sometimes, people won’t even be able to see where your “dash” was originally, giving it the appearance of a run-on sentence. You can turn off the autotype special character function in Word, and just use the -- to reduce this problem. There’s a special command in HTML that can give you a real em dash online, but for most of us, just using it correctly in writing is a more formidable task than using HTML characters.) I'm mixing up two hyphens/special characters in this post.
So if you didn’t use the simple hyphen (-) in your formal writing, and you know you’re using either the double hyphen to indicate a dash, or a special character that’s auto formatted for you (—), and you’re all set as to how the physical manifestation of the dash looks onscreen, then how do you use in writing? Well, the first rule I’d give is: don’t overuse it. I see a lot of amateur writers who throw colons and dashes around like salt. A lot of dashes in text will end up creating a choppy effect for your reader, turning them away from your story just because they’re having a tough time following it.
You want to focus on a couple areas. First is setting off parenthetical material that really deserves an extra punch. “All the disasters that occurred when the crew was on the planet — from the five dead Alliance cops to the hole blown in Serenity’s port side to Zoe’s gunshot wound — were blamed on Jayne.” “Simon believed that River had been tortured — more importantly, he now had the information to prove it.” In both those cases, the parts of the sentence after the dash could be contained either in parentheses or on their own as sentences, but by using a dash, you can bring them into the sentence and give it an extra oomph it wouldn’t otherwise have had.
You also use a dash for setting off what are called appositives, when they contain commas. Yeah, I know, I promised no technical grammar, but that’s what they’re called; appositives are nouns that rename a nearby noun. So you’d have something like “Serenity — a Firefly class ship weighing five thousand metric tons, carrying nine crew members, and additional cargo — flies outside the boundaries of the Alliance.” In this case, Serenity is your noun, and the info after the dash (Firefly class ship) is the appositive that renames it. Now, technically, you could just use commas there, or parentheses -- most of the time, that’s pretty much what you do with appositives. But a dash does this nifty thing where it gives the reader a chance to see the importance of all those pauses created by the commas, and of course adds extra emphasis. When you use dashes in a construction like this, use them sparingly if you’re not comfy yet with the concept. It’s really easy to use them badly or incorrectly in this way if you don’t quite know what you’re looking at. (And I have no idea what Serenity weighs; please don’t write to me and lecture me about how it really weighs X, because I just made it up for a point, and I haven’t got a freaking clue about the real weight and size.)
The last thing you’ll want to use a dash for is when you’re throwing in a list, a restatement, amplifying a point, or making a dramatic shift in thought or tone. Here are some examples of all of these:
In the cabinet were all the things Simon would need for basic doctoring -- bandages, drugs, implements, and even a sterilizer.
When you think about it, it’s hard to believe Jayne has managed to live this long -- his IQ can’t possibly be larger than his shoe size, and his violent temper always gets the best of him.
There were Alliance cops everywhere Mal looked — armed to the teeth and fully licensed to kill anyone they wished to.
Kaylee dribbled the basketball around Book, dodged Mal’s outstretched hand, and made her shot -- a perfect ball right through the hoop.
So you can get a sense here that the dash isn’t so much a necessity for a sentence, but adds flavor when used judiciously. Colons could also be used in many cases, if you wanted to, but dashes have drama. You wouldn’t want to use them where it won’t add punch to the sentence: “Having Simon on board -- for his medical background -- made a lot of sense, despite his insane sister’s potential for damage.” Sound it out, using the dashes as an extra long pause, and you’ll have a good idea if the dash is right for your prose. I know I keep harping on reading things aloud, but I truly believe that for newbie writers or folks who have trouble areas in prose, sounding out your writing can solve a lot of problems if you listen to how it reads.
The last note about dashes: everyone wonders if it should be closed or open on the sides. Well, a lot of that depends on what style guide you're using, if you're using one, and what your personal preference is. Some style guides call for space on either side of the dash, as I've done throughout this post. Others want you to close it up (everywhere Mal looked--armed to the teeth). I've found that for fanfic, in HTML, the open method works better for lines breaking at a dash, so I use this most often online. In my formal writing that's not online, I close it up, unless I'm working for a client whose guidelines state otherwise. For once, it's something that's entirely your choice!
