How To Use Dashes And Colons
Some authors such as novelist kurt vonnegut jr would prefer to do away with the semicolon altogether.
How to use dashes and colons. It is also less formal than a colon. The two hobbies before the colon are defined after the colon as cooking and bothering aardvark. It will explain instances when it is appropriate to use colons and dashes according to style and audience. They are more formal than dashes. The sentence above is the perfect example.
After reading the handout you will be better able to decide when to use these forms of punctuation in your own writing. A colon is used at the end of a complete thought to introduce a list an explanation or a formal quotation. However em dashes are more emphatic than colons. A dashing young man is certainly not an ordinary young man and if you re dashing off to the store you re not just going to the store you re going in a flurry. The short dash used to show a syllable break or to form a compound term such as in class assignment.
When you want to generate strong emotion in your writing or create a more casual tone use em dashes. This handout explains the most common uses of three kinds of punctuation. The words after a colon define or clarify what came before the colon. A dash can add extra information and is more flexible in this way. These three punctuation marks semicolons colons and dashes are most effective when they re used sparingly.
A dash also introduces extra material but well a dash is quite a dramatic punctuation mark. We use colons in writing for five things. Semicolons colons and dashes. After all the dash adds the same length of pause as a semicolon but without the risk it s almost impossible to screw up. A colon informs readers that something more is coming along.
Do not use a colon if the list or explanation is connected to the sentence without a complete stop. Hyphens en dashes and em dashes. What this handout is about. Use a dash in place of a colon use an em dash instead of a colon when you want to emphasize the conclusion of your sentence without giving it all of the connotations that a colon brings. Yet after witnessing the semicolon being used incorrectly more often than not i prefer to simply recommend the dash instead especially as i have a fondness for it as my overuse of it in this article alone indicates.