Legal Writing

7 Tips for Using Suspensive Hyphenation

By Mark Nichol

Often, when both items in a pair of hyphenated phrases have a common element, the first instance of that element can be elided, or omitted, without erasing the connection; the incomplete phrase is implied to have the same form as the complete one. However, as shown in these examples, it?s essential to treat the phrases, especially their hyphens, correctly:

1. ?The holding pond?s collapse sent more than a billion gallons of arsenic and mercury-laden sludge into the river.?
The sludge was laden with a combination of arsenic and mercury; arsenic was not released separately from mercury-laden sludge. Because laden can serve to team up with both arsenic and mercury, it is omitted from where it might first appear; the phrase ?arsenic-laden? is merely implied. A hyphen is attached to arsenic to express the elision: ?The holding pond?s collapse sent more than a billion gallons of arsenic- and mercury-laden sludge into the river.?

2. ?The company provides small- and medium-size businesses with service and support.?
The hyphen following small implies that ?small-size? is the intended construction, but size is not appropriate in association with small: ?The company provides small and medium-size businesses with service and support.?

3. ?The 1-2 year old wolf is still a baby.?
The confusing adjective string before wolf is meant to express that the animal is either a 1-year-old or a 2-year-old. You can write that an animal is 1-2 years old, but here you must hyphenate the construction ?(number)-year-old? to modify the noun that follows.

The correct full form of the sentence would be ?The 1-year-old to 2-year-old wolf is still a baby,? but the first instance of ?year-old? can be elided: ?The 1- to 2-year-old wolf is still a baby.? Note the letter space following 1- — this element has no connection to to, so don?t connect them.

4. ?Marc Antony was seen as Cleopatra?s drink-and-love besotted dupe.?
The trainlike coupling of ?drink-and-love? makes no grammatical sense. Observers thought of Marc Antony as separately besotted by drink and love, so he was a drink-besotted dope and a love-besotted dope, or, as follows: ?Marc Antony was seen as Cleopatra?s drink- and love-besotted dupe.?

5. ?The difference between pre- and post-Civil War attitudes was profound.?
The elision of ?Civil War? after pre- is correct, but when a prefix or suffix is attached (or implied to attach) to a proper noun or to more than one term, a sturdy en dash is called in to substitute for the little hyphen: ?The difference between pre– and post–Civil War attitudes was profound.?

6. ?She felt underpaid and -appreciated.?
Though use of suspensive hyphenation in the case of words with otherwise closed prefixes (?The fund was alternately over- and underfunded?) is correct, avoid applying it with closed suffixes: ?She felt underpaid and underappreciated.?

7. ?The box contained a stack of 3- by 5-inch cards.?
By signals that this sentence does not refer to 3-inch cards and 5-inch cards; this statement is in a separate class. When two dimensions refer to a single object, link the entire phrasal adjective together: ?The box contained a stack of 3-by-5-inch cards.?

Full post as published by Daily Writing Tips on February 22, 2011 (boomark / email).