H
Headings
Use lower case apart from first letter and proper nouns.
Hyphens and other dashes
Hyphens: not be mistaken for a dash! Hyphens are used to make sentences clear and to avoid ambiguity.
- Look, a man eating shark | Look, a man-eating shark
- The two year-old trees| The two-year-old trees
- Don’t panic buy petrol | Don’t panic-buy petrol
There is no need for hyphens where the meaning of the phrase is clear.
- High street shops
- Energy efficiency rating
Or after words ending in -ly.
- Fully funded course
- Constantly evolving curriculum
Do use them with adverbs such as ill, much, well.
- Well-established principles of style
- Much-loved lecturer
But if you turn the sentence around there is no need to hyphenate.
- The principles of style are well established
And before -based and -related
- university-based study
- geography-related subjects
After a hyphen, use lower case.
- Object-oriented
- Post-compulsory Education
Hyphenated
- decision-making
- fast-tracked
- full-time
- high-risk care
- non-specific
- part-time
- problem-based learning
- project-based
- self-managed
- south-east
See also All one word!
En dashes: so called because they are the width of an n [–]. We use them mostly in date and number ranges, with no space either side.
¬ 15–25 December
¬ Course fees are £7,500–£9,000
¬ Monday–Friday
Sometimes you’ll need to use an en dash and a hyphen in the same compound. Best avoided really!
¬ 15,000–20,000-word dissertation
En dashes can also be used to punctuate body copy with a space either side – when you have something really cool to emphasise – otherwise use commas. Semi colons and colons also have their place here.
Em dashes are the width of an m [—]. We tend not to use them, mostly for practical reasons. They take up rather a lot of room especially when columns are narrow. They are useful in prose/fiction, to add drama and emphasis, and also in quotations.