Hyphens
When two words are put together to form a new word, often the words are joined with a hyphen. You can always check the dictionary to see whether the combination is hyphenated or not, but there are some helpful guidelines.
- A group of words used to modify a following noun is usually hyphenated, especially if the second word is a past participle:
employee-owned stock, well-known personality
- Ex- in the sense of former is always followed by a hyphen:
ex-president, ex-Communist
- A prefix is followed by a hyphen if the root word begins with a vowel or a capital letter:
anti-intellectual, pro-British
Hyphens to divide words at the end of a line
Most word processing programs either automatically scrolled down to the next line without dividing a word or they automatically divide the word in the right place. If you don't have a program that does this task for you, here are some guidelines that will help.
- A word that is divided at the end of a line must be divided at a syllable break. It's best to check a dictionary if you're not sure where the syllable comes in the word you want to divide. However, there are some guidelines that might help you find the right place to divide a word.
- One-syllable words should never be divided. It is usually safe to divide a word after a prefix, before a suffix, or between double consonants:
con-fluence, intra-mural, documenta-tion, hope-less, har-rowing, bub-ble
- It is best to avoid dividing proper names or words that have six or fewer letters. A word should not be divided after a two-letter prefix or at the end of the first line of a paragraph or at the end of the last full line of a paragraph.
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