Punctuation Bonanza: Part 2: Em Dash, Hyphens, & Ellipses

Let the punctuation fun continue, grammar friends! This excellent day, we're on to em dashes (another personal favorite of mine!), hyphens, and ellipses. 

EM DASHES

The majestic em dash--queen of the punctuation sea.

Nothing adds flair--drama--pomp and circumstance--moxie to a sentence like the em dash. It's constructed with 2 dashes (emphasis on 2, TWO, dos, deux),  that's 2 dashes (- -) and NO spaces on either side of it: Word--word. (There's lots of togetherness with em dashes.) This mark follows few guidelines and can masquerade as a comma, colon, or parentheses. 

And that's why it's the best.

The mid-sentence rogue.

Last week, I talked about the non-essential element comma. Placed on either side of a modifying (but not grammatically important) statement, the non-essential element commas signal that the information between is a side-note adding clarity. 

The Doctor, who's an alien from Galifrey, flies around all of space and time in the TARDIS. 

The commas surrounding "who's an alien from Galifrey" tell us that the sentence will make sense if we lift this part out (The Doctor flies around all of space and time in the TARDIS.), but it was included because it modifies what we know about our subject, The Doctor. Grammatically, this is as it must be. 

But wait! What if I don't want that interesting morsel classified as less important grammatical information? This is where the em dash saves the day! 

The Doctor--who's an alien from Galifrey--flies around all of space and time in the TARDIS. 

Check that out! The em dashes in this example are still surrounding a non-essential element, but instead of quietly interrupting the sentence ("ahem") comma-style, they're busting in to share the info via megaphone. 

That's what em dashes do--they punch up the parsed information like neon arrows pointing right at it! You can almost hear the intonation rise between the em dashes (imagine me jumping up and down) and it makes the piece stand out. 

It works the same way when replacing parentheses:

Donna Noble (fastest temp in Chiswick) was spunky and amazing! 

Donna Noble--fastest temp in Chiswick--was spunky and amazing! (Donna wouldn't want that tidbit buried!)

The statement maker!

Em dashes add a lot of noise to a sentence. They're bold and they draw the eye straight into a point. It's important not to overuse them, but they're great to have around when there's something critical to say. 

When an em dash replaces a colon, it's debuting at the end of the sentence. While colons require a complete sentence first (The 11th Doctor had a great nickname for Amy Pond: The Girl Who Waited), em dashes do not. 

Rory Williams was known as--the Last Centurion. 

And while colons signal that the information following it will be modifying the initial part of the sentence (in the most politest way), the em dash is there to dramatize. This is key to using the em dash properly. You don't want to throw down an em dash for a grocery list:

I went to the store--to buy apples, yogurt, and milk. (I can't read that without hearing the booming movie-trailer guy: "The most important list--in the world...")

That's a bit much. So when using the em dash, make sure the information after it is pretty critical. 

When discussing sci-fi shows with a new friend, it's important to remember that Whovians may become over-excitable about things like British police boxes, David Tennant, and Converse tennis shoes, so unless you're comfortable with someone exploding breathlessly into a conversation in which you're now both talking at the same time--avoid mentioning Doctor Who. 

HYPHENS

Not to be confused with the splendid em dash. 

Hyphens are not the same as the em dash, which is why it's crucial to use 2 dashes (--) for the em dash. Hyphens form compound words by combining single words with 1 dash (-). Like the em dash, there are no spaces on either side of the hyphen: fancy-new-long-word. 

Bring me your words--all of them--and in one long string. 

Pardon my dip into nerdom, but Medieval poetry is abundant with hyphenated compound words, specifically adjectives called kennings:

Battle-shirt

Ring-giver

Mead-hall

Wave-rider

Shield-bearer

Earth-dwellers 

Not all compound words require hyphens (every time, mind frame) or even spaces (whodunit, checkout), and honestly, the best way to know if you've written it correctly is to get a dictionary and check. With compound nouns, it's more about familiarity (how long has it been around in our language), than it is about grammatical usage. The compound word elders no longer get hyphenated. 

Compound adjectives on the other hand--those have rules to help. There are 3 questions to ask:

1. Are these actually adjectives? (Good)

2. Are they describing the same noun? (Good)

3. Does one of them end in -ly? (Not so much)

If your compound word or phrase is constructed with adjectives describing the same noun, and no one's using an -ly ending, then you hyphenate:

The bigger-on-the-inside TARDIS is a shock to the newcomers. 

The compound adjective, "bigger-on-the-inside," is describing the noun, TARDIS, so the words get hyphenated. 

The TARDIS is bigger on the inside. 

The brown-striped  jacket and vest were favorites of the 10th Doctor. 

My poorly constructed sonic screwdriver broke during the Dalek attack. 

While descriptive, "bigger on the inside" is no longer an adjective for TARDIS, so they don't get hyphenated anymore. "Brown" and "striped" are both adjectives describing "tweed jacket," so they do get hyphenated (you can also use a comma in this instance: brown, striped tweed jacket). Last but not least, "poorly" and "constructed" are both adjectives describing the same noun, "sonic screwdriver," but "poorly" ends in -ly, so no hyphen. 

ELLIPSES

The dot-dot-dot dance

Ellipses show omission and where they come up in academic writing is during quotations. To make an ellipses, you put three periods (...) in a row with no spaces on either side: words...missing.

Respect the punctuation

When quoting, you want to honor the original capitalization, spelling errors (that's the [sic] thing), and punctuation from the source material. If you change anything, you need to show it. For instance, if you capitalize a letter to make it fit your sentence structure, you need to include brackets around the letter: "...[I]n Anglo-Saxon literature."

Being specific with quotes means cutting up and welding together the good bits.

True facts. If I'm analyzing the different ways the 11th Doctor asserts his self-observed "madness" to Amy Pond, then I don't need this whole quote:

“Amy Pond, there’s something you’d better understand about me ‘cause it’s important, and one day your life may depend on it: I am definitely a mad man with a box!”  (Doctor Who, season 5, episode 1)

Let's say it's not important to my argument that the Doctor thinks Amy Pond must understand his madness in terms of her own safety, but it does matter that he verbally asserts to Amy how he understands himself. I would want to condense the quote, using ellipses to show my omissions from the original:

"Amy Pond...I am definitely a mad man with a box!" 

I keep the exclamation point at the end because this is the terminal punctuation mark for the original quote. Since I'm ending with the end of the original sentence, I keep the original mark. I did remove the colon though because "Amy Pond" is not a complete sentence anymore. The colon would become grammatically incorrect, so it becomes part of the represented omissions in my ellipses. 

"Amy Pond, there's something you'd better understand about me 'cause it's important...: I am definitely a mad man with a box!"

This is where I'd keep the colon. The first part of the sentence is complete, despite my splicing, so the colon can stay to add emphasis to my quote. 

I cut out the first part! Or maybe it was the end? It's wibbly-wobbly.

If you're omitting the first part of the original, then you add ellipses right at the front:

Original:

"Do what I do. Hold tight and pretend it's a plan!" (Doctor Who, season 7, Christmas Special)

Paper:

"...pretend it's a plan!"

If you've cut out the end of a sentence, even if it looks grammatically complete when spliced, you add an ellipses to the end:

"I am definitely a mad man..."

Do I keep the period?

If you cut out a middle part, but start at the end of an original sentence, then you keep the original punctuation marks, add a space, and the ellipses afterwards:

"Do what I do. ...pretend it's a plan!" (Looks weird, but it's correct)

Additional Resources:

The Punctuation Guide: http://www.thepunctuationguide.com 

A Manual for Writers of Research Papers, Theses, and Dissertations (8th ed.) by Kate L. Turabian (On reserve in the library!)