# hyphen

Pronunciation: say "HY-fuhn" /ˈhaɪ.fən/

## Noun

1. A short punctuation mark (‐) used to join two or more words into a compound, or to show that a word has been split across a line break.
   - Simple: A short line (-) used to join words together or to break a word at the end of a line.
   - _The style guide says to place a hyphen in 'well-known' when it comes before a noun._
   - _When the word would not fit, the typesetter added a hyphen and continued it on the line below._
3. A minor thing that serves as a link between two things of greater importance than itself.
   - Simple: A small thing that connects two bigger or more important things.
   - _The narrow isthmus is a hyphen joining two great landmasses._
   - _In the family business, the youngest partner was a mere hyphen between the two dominant founders._
4. An enclosed passage built to link one building with another.
   - Simple: A covered walkway that joins two buildings.
   - _The hospital wings are joined by a heated hyphen above the courtyard._
   - _Visitors cross from the gallery to the library through a glazed hyphen._
5. A person belonging to a marginalized subgroup, identifiable by a hyphenated label such as 'German-American' or 'Mexican-American'.
   - Simple: A person from a minority group named by a hyphenated term, like 'German-American'.
   - _The memoir gives voice to the hyphen who never fully belongs to either nation._
   - _Many hyphens describe living between two languages and two sets of expectations._

## Conjunction

6. Written or spoken as a word between two terms to emphasize the joining that the punctuation mark '-' usually indicates.
   - Simple: Used between two words, said aloud or written out, to stress that they belong together, like the mark '-'.
   - _Aloud she introduced him as her partner hyphen co-author._
   - _The brochure promised a relaxing spa hyphen boot camp hyphen detox retreat, which sounded exhausting._

## Verb

2. To mark a word or phrase with a hyphen; to hyphenate. *(dated)*
   - Simple: To join or split words by putting a small line between them.
   - _Older style guides advised writers to hyphen compound adjectives before a noun._
   - _The clerk hyphened the long surname on each official record._

## Origin

From Late Latin, from Ancient Greek ὑφέν (huphén, 'together'), a contraction of ὑφ’ ἕν (huph’ hén, 'under one'), from ὑπό (hupó, 'under') plus ἕν (hén, 'one').

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/hyphen (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).