Comments on: Hyphens

Question: Hyphens

Blackwatch — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 08:16:21 -0800

What are great, memorable examples of where a hyphen can completely change the meaning of a phrase or sentence?

"I'm looking for a little used car" has a different meaning to "I'm looking for a little-used car".

Can anyone supply more memorable or hard-hitting phrases to demonstrate the importance of using hyphens correctly?

Funny and or rude examples are positively encouraged, and I'd particularly appreciate examples where a misplaced or omitted hyphen might land you with a defamation suit!

Thanks a lot.

By: Mr. Anthropomorphism

Mr. Anthropomorphism — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 08:18:46 -0800

http://www.xkcd.com/37/

By: rokusan

rokusan — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 08:30:58 -0800

I re-sent that e-mail.

By: ekroh

ekroh — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 08:31:21 -0800

I don't know if it's hard hitting or not (yes no hyphen for hard hitting because it comes after the verb), but something that comes up a lot in my editing work is the hyphenation of "small business," as in a small business tax credit as opposed to a small-business tax credit.

By: rokusan

rokusan — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 08:31:44 -0800

Extra-marital sex.

By: grumblebee

grumblebee — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 08:32:50 -0800

Man-eating dog.

By: rokusan

rokusan — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 08:33:26 -0800

(And other variations on that, like "extra solar planets" vs "extra-solar planets.")

By: rokusan

rokusan — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 08:36:39 -0800

Five-hundred-year old statues. (Or "five hundred-year old statues.")

By: rokusan

rokusan — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 08:38:59 -0800

I dealt with a young lady last week who had a name tag reading "Model Store Manager".

That one could have used a hyphen. Or an explanation.

By: Perplexity

Perplexity — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 08:39:59 -0800

What's the best part about sleeping with twenty[-]three year olds?

By: molecicco

molecicco — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 08:40:46 -0800

anarchist-free space vs. anarchist free-space

By: rokusan

rokusan — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 08:41:44 -0800

We un-ionized the office.

(I could do this all day. I'd better stop.)

By: rokusan

rokusan — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 08:44:24 -0800

Okay, okay, ONE more...

There are no-smoking restrictions at any of our restaurants.

By: laumry

laumry — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 08:47:01 -0800

Example from Strunk and White's The Elements Of Style:

"The hyphen can play tricks on the unwary, as it did in Chattanooga when two newspapers merged—the News and the Free Press. Someone introduced a hyphen into the merger, and the paper became The Chattanooga News-Free Press, which sounds as though the paper were news-free, or devoid of news. Obviously, we ask too much of a hyphen when we ask it to cast its spell over words it does not adjoin."

By: rokusan

rokusan — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 08:47:03 -0800

(strike ~~any of~~, sorry.)

By: ROU_Xenophobe

ROU_Xenophobe — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 09:01:05 -0800

I haven't verified it, but the lore is that back in the early/mid nineteenth century a tariff bill was before the House that included "there shall be no tax on fruit-trees." Some wag successfully amended the "-" to a ",".

By: DevilsAdvocate

DevilsAdvocate — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 09:05:35 -0800

twenty one dollar bills vs. twenty-one dollar bills

By: johnio

johnio — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 09:18:45 -0800

The site Experts-Exchange.com used to not have the hyphen, thus spelling out ExpertSexChange.com.

By: fings

fings — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 09:25:09 -0800

"You don't have to work that hard on Saturday." vs "You don't have to work that hard-on Saturday."

By: sanko

sanko — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 09:46:10 -0800

Q: What's the best thing about sex with twenty[- ]five-year-olds?
A: There are twenty of them.

By: weapons-grade pandemonium

weapons-grade pandemonium — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 09:50:25 -0800

McDONALD'S NOW SERVING ALCOHOL FREE BEER

By: booth

booth — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 10:00:44 -0800

High school students.

By: non sum qualis eram

non sum qualis eram — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 11:00:26 -0800

This could very well be the stuff of urban legend, but while I was in college we heard the story of a student group holding an Anti Gay-Hate Rally... and you've probably guessed that the story ends with the signage misprinted as Anti-Gay Hate Rally.

By: Billegible

Billegible — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 12:14:09 -0800

Eight Legged Freaks vs Eight-legged Freaks.

By: effluvia

effluvia — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 12:14:19 -0800

Your question reminds me of the film "The Conversation"

A taped snippet of a conversation where inflection changes the whole meaning of the sentence:

"He'd kill us if he had the chance."

Great film.

By: DevilsAdvocate

DevilsAdvocate — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 13:44:25 -0800

Just realized I can improve my previous example to make it a three-way:

twenty one-dollar bills vs. twenty-one dollar bills vs. twenty-one-dollar bills

By: usonian

usonian — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 14:09:42 -0800

Once upon a time, penisland.com was the web site of Pen Island, who would sell you pens featuring their domain. And experts-exchange.com used to be expertsexchange.com.

By: moonmilk

moonmilk — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 14:28:50 -0800

I haven't been able to find who coined the term, but I've seen "mishy-phen" used to describe words or phrases that are amusingly mishy-
phenated.

By: SomePerlGeek

SomePerlGeek — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 15:02:35 -0800

The placement of a hyphen in the word therapist is something you'd want to be careful about.

By: Blackwatch

Blackwatch — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 03:16:16 -0800

Some great ones here - thanks so much for your help.

By: Ingenting

Ingenting — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 13:26:55 -0800

I know something like this in swedish:

"Mörkhårig sjukgymnast" means darkhaired physiotherapist, while
"Mörk hårig sjuk gymnast" means dark, hairy, sick gymnast.