Hyphen
You know how to type a hyphen and that’s exactly why you use it so often in all the wrong places. The hyphen is used to break single words into parts (like when lines of type break within a word) or to combine separate words into one single words.
I’m hungry in a get-in-my-belly kind of way.
En dash
The en dash is used in dates to replace “to” or “and”. It can also be used to indicate the relationship between two different words. In German it is also used for a break of thought, with a space before and after the en dash.
I lived in the United States from 1976–1978.
I have a love–hate relationship with San Francisco.
Em dash
The em dash is used for a break of thought that is stronger than a thought within parentheses. It is a break in the sentence in order to create attention or stress a thought. The em dash is uncommon in the German language and most common in American type setting.
I once had to replace 1,000 hyphens in a single document—exhausting.
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