Here is a screenshot from a Word 97 (yes, Word 97) session: A screen shot of Word 97 (running under Wine on Linux), and faking a nonbreaking en rule using a stretched nonbreaking hyphen and a change of font. If it is not a good visual match to the en rule, and you can be bothered, try changing fonts and experimenting until it looks good. Highlight it, choose Ctrl+D and then use the Scale option to make it wider until it is the length of an en dash. Instead of an en rule, insert a nonbreaking hyphen. Option 3 (works at least as far back as Word 97!) So, if on early versions of Word, Option 3 may be best (or only), poor as it is. They sure like capitalising everything! No- Width Non Break.Ĭaveat: The N o- W idth N on B reak is present in Word 2010 (and maybe earlier), but does not actually work, at least in my experience. If you need it regularly you can assign a shortcut to it. Option 2 (the better one, as suggested by Daniel)Īfter typing/inserting the en dash, go to Insert and then Symbols and select Special Characters and choose No-Width Non Break. Nonbreaking en dash between 14 and 34 using a 1% width nonbreaking space. The nonbreaking space after the en dash does not break on either side, so fixes the problem. It does not accept 0%, but a space 1% of the width of a normal one is close enough to invisible. Go to Advanced, then select the Scale drop-down menu and type something like 1%. Type ’15– 34′ where the gap after the dash is a nonbreaking space (Ctrl-Shift-Space in Windows) and then select the nonbreaking space and type Ctrl+D (or go to the Font menu from the Home ribbon). It seems that at some point Microsoft changed the behaviour of some special characters/codes in Word or in Word’s file format. I cannot speak for 2013 versions or versions on Mac. They do work in Word 2016 (in my experience) and later. So… Note that these options do not work in versions of Word up to and including Word 2010. But, Word does the breaking after the en dash. If you are in Word and type ’15–34′, the ’34’ can end up on the next line – the en dash is breaking. June Casagrande is the author of “The Best Punctuation Book, Period.” She can be reached at our coverage by becoming a digital subscriber.I call them en rules, but I’m out-voted on that one.Īnyway, in line with one commenter on this post, I’ll point out how it can be done. On a PC, hold down control and press the minus sign on a number pad. To make an en dash on a Mac, hold down the option key then press the hyphen key. They’re also used in place of hyphens to connect numbers with words or prefixes, like pre–1800, and for ranges and sports scores, like “the Dolphins won 10–7.” But a hyphen can do all these jobs nicely if you’re not working in an en dash world. For example, they can connect two terms that already have hyphens in them, like in a semi-private–semi-public entity. Old-school newswires couldn’t transmit them properly and so en dashes never became part of news editing style.īook and magazine publishing will use an en dash, which is longer than a hyphen but shorter than an em dash, as a sort of uber hyphen. In most newswriting, they don’t exist at all. They connect words with other words, numbers, prefixes and suffixes to create terms like “forward-looking” or “pre-1950” or “full-time” or “e-reader.” You can use them to build your own multiword adjectives, as in a “true-crime obsession.” Some terms already contain hyphens in their proper spelling, which you can find in a dictionary, as in “good-looking” and “jack-of-all-trades.”Įn dashes, which work more like hyphens than like em dashes, are rare. Unlike em dashes, hyphens are not sentence punctuation. All these systems offer other ways to make em dashes, too. In many word processing programs, you can just type two hyphens then the space bar and auto correct will make an em dash for you. On a PC with a number pad, you can type the minus key while holding down the control and alt keys. To make an em dash on a Mac computer, you type the hyphen key while holding down the shift and option keys. Book and magazine publishing usually omit the spaces-their dashes touch the word on either side. News publications usually put a space on either side of an em dash - making it sort of float. A period or possibly a semicolon would be better. Personally, I consider it a mistake to use an em dash between complete clauses - this sentence is an example. You can even use em dashes for dialogue, datelines or taglines or to show that speech was cut off mid-sentence. They can also set off lists of items - names, places, things - mid-sentence or at the end. Or you can use em dashes to set off parenthetical thoughts - and who doesn’t love those? - in a sentence. But if your sentence already has enough commas or if you want to create visual emphasis - like this - you can use em dashes to signal a change in sentence structure or thought.
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