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Anonymous Posted 17 years ago
Grammar
Adjective and participle before a noun connected by a hyphen
Hi. Is it incorrect to have a phrase construction that includes an adjective and a participle acting as an adjective connected by a hyphen?
eg,
bad-smelling dog
Is this phrase construction correct? Which is correct?
badly-smelling dog
badly smelling dog
eg,
bad-smelling dog
Is this phrase construction correct? Which is correct?
badly-smelling dog
badly smelling dog
Top answer
hey, both sentences are incorrect badly-smelling dog and badly smelling dog. Because badly is an advervb and adverbs qualify the verb. In this case you're qualyfing the noun dog, so the correct form is bad smelling dog.
- hey, both sentences are incorrect badly-smelling dog and badly smelling dog.
- Because badly is an advervb and adverbs qualify the verb.
- In this case you're qualyfing the noun dog, so the correct form is bad smelling dog.
- Concerning the hyphen I'd use it to avoid ambiguity, because if you don't use it you can have two ideas, if I say Rex is a bad smelling dog, do I mean that Rex is a bad dog and it's also smelling or its smell is bad?
- So to avoid that you might say: Rex is a bad-smelling dog, this way you make clear that bad is related to smelling and not to the dog.
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4 Answers
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hey,
both sentences are incorrect badly-smelling dog and badly smelling dog. Because badly is an advervb and adverbs qualify the verb. In this case you're qualyfing the noun dog, so the correct form is bad smelling dog. Concerning the hyphen I'd use it to avoid ambiguity, because if you don't use it you can have two ideas, if I say Rex is a bad smelling dog, do I mean that Rex is a b
both sentences are incorrect badly-smelling dog and badly smelling dog. Because badly is an advervb and adverbs qualify the verb. In this case you're qualyfing the noun dog, so the correct form is bad smelling dog. Concerning the hyphen I'd use it to avoid ambiguity, because if you don't use it you can have two ideas, if I say Rex is a bad smelling dog, do I mean that Rex is a b
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Thank you. I think it is a common knowledge that an adverb modifies an adjective in addition to a verb or another adverb.
badly smelling (or badly-smelling) dog -- Not correctly written??
badly smelling (or badly-smelling) dog -- Not correctly written??
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badly smelling (or badly-smelling) dog -- A dog whose nose does not work well.
bad smelling (or bad-smelling) dog -- A dog who emits an unpleasant odor
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badly smelling (or badly-smelling) dog -- A dog whose nose does not work well.
bad smelling (or bad-smelling) dog -- A dog who emits an unpleasant odor
.
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In the US, at the very least, it is incorrect to hyphenate -ly adverbial premodifiers. It is seen as a redundancy, since the relationship is already very clear.
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