earth—Generally lowercase, except in context with other properly named planets: A solar eclipse occurs when the moon passes between the earth and the sun. They are studying the earth’s atmosphere. The class is studying Mercury, Venus, and Earth.
East Side—Buffalo's East Side; New York's Lower East Side. (See directions and regions.)
editions—See titles, composition.
elect—Compounds with elect, meaning newly elected, are hyphenated unless the office title contains two or more words: president-elect, senator-elect, town assessor elect, vice president elect.
ellipsis (...)—Three dots used to indicate an omission in quoted material. Do not set off with a space on each side: “Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation…dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.”
email (but e-book, e-commerce, etc.)
em dash—The em dash (—) is used to set off parenthetical material or to signify an abrupt change in thought. The em dash can also replace the colon. It is the width of the capital M in the typeface used. Do not set off with a space on each side: She considered the dwarves—all but Grumpy—fine company. He said he needed three things—lawyers, guns, and money.
emeritus (masculine singular), emerita (feminine singular), emeriti (plural)
en dash—The en dash (–) is longer than the hyphen (-) and shorter than the em dash (—). Its principal use “is to connect continuing or inclusive numbers (ranges)—dates, times, or reference numbers.” (7) Do not set off with a space on each side: The report covered 1992–1998. Do not use the words from or between with the en dash: Wrong: from 1962–1972, between 1968–1970. Right: 1968–1972, from 1968 to 1972. “The en dash also is used in place of a hyphen in a compound adjective when one of the elements of the adjective is an open compound: post–Civil War, New York–London flight.” (8)
equator
ex- (prefix)—Generally closed, no hyphen: exclude, expose, extract. Compounds with ex meaning former are not recommended in formal writing; former, without a hyphen, is preferable: former president Gerald Ford, former senator. If used, hyphenate: ex-president, ex-husband. Use an en dash if the second part is an open compound: ex–vice president. (See prefixes and suffixes.)
extra- (prefix)—Generally closed, no hyphen: extraterrestrial, extrafine. (See prefixes and suffixes.)
(7) Chicago Manual of Style, 14th edition (1993), 5.115
(8) Ibid., 5.117
Some content on this page is saved in PDF format. To view these files, download Adobe Acrobat Reader free. If you are having trouble reading a document, request an accessible copy of the PDF or Word Document.
