How To Use Dashes In Middle Of Sentence
Everything i saw in my new neighborhood from the graceful elm trees to the stately brick buildings reminded me of my alma mater.
How to use dashes in middle of sentence. Use a dash to show a pause or break in meaning in the middle of a sentence. The material inside the dashes relates to the information in the rest of the sentence but it acts as an interruption to the main point that you re making. To show a range of dates times or values. Confusing louie stormed into the room and took four items off the desk a pen a paper clip and two sheets of paper before leaving in a hurry. The em dash is perhaps the most versatile punctuation mark.
A dash may or may not have a space on either side of it. They also serve different functions within a sentence. However some people use only one dash to tack a complete sentence onto another complete sentence. A good way to remember the difference between these two dashes is to visualize the en dash as the length of the letter n and the em dash as the length of the letter m. Do not confuse a dash with a hyphen which is shorter.
On a windows based system you can form an em dash on a keyboard by holding down the alt key and typing 0151 to create the em dash on a macintosh based system hold down the shift and option keys and press the minus key notes techwalla adding that alternatively you can. Ap style calls for a space on both sides of an em dash but most other styles including mla and apa omit the spaces. Some style and grammar guides even permit you to write a complete sentence within the dashes. This grammar lesson offers an explanation on the correct use of dashes and gives examples of dashes used in sentences. Dashes are often used to signal an abrupt change in a sentence.
The words between a pair of dashes may or may not form a complete sentence. This is a punctuation lesson on using dashes. What is an em dash and when should you use it. The most common types of dashes are the en dash and the em dash. My brothers richard and john are visiting hanoi.
To properly use a dash in an english sentence start by identifying which dash you should use. Dashes are used to extend a sentence to replace colons semicolons or three dots. On both sides of a list in the middle of a sentence when that list contains commas. Depending on the context the em dash can take the place of commas parentheses or colons in each case to slightly different effect. Two dashes can emphasize material in the middle of a sentence.