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Rozarria Posted 17 years ago
Grammar
Compound Modifiers
I once asked about the presence of the hyphen in compound modifiers, and it was confirmed that when the compound modifier precedes the noun, it requires a hyphen; if it comes after it, it does not.
Example:
"The frequent-eating fallacy pervades the American lifestyle."
"The fallacy of frequent eating pervades the American lifestyle."
The above example has already been verified as correct. Now, I have another question concerning this. What if there are TWO instances of a compound modifier?
Example:
"We had to change our conceptions of the previously-assumed water-based nature of the reaction."
vs.
"We had to change our conceptions of the previously assumed water-based nature of the reaction."
vs.
"We had to change our conceptions of the previously-assumed water based nature of the reaction."
Where do the hyphens go? Help would be greatly appreciated, as usual.
-rozarria
Example:
"The frequent-eating fallacy pervades the American lifestyle."
"The fallacy of frequent eating pervades the American lifestyle."
The above example has already been verified as correct. Now, I have another question concerning this. What if there are TWO instances of a compound modifier?
Example:
"We had to change our conceptions of the previously-assumed water-based nature of the reaction."
vs.
"We had to change our conceptions of the previously assumed water-based nature of the reaction."
vs.
"We had to change our conceptions of the previously-assumed water based nature of the reaction."
Where do the hyphens go? Help would be greatly appreciated, as usual.
-rozarria
Top answer
Hi, Here's my reaction to this. Piling together a lot of these compound modifiers in front of a noun usually just results in English that is imprecise, unclear, inelegant and unnatural. Instead, use other wording.
- Hi, Here's my reaction to this.
- Piling together a lot of these compound modifiers in front of a noun usually just results in English that is imprecise, unclear, inelegant and unnatural.
- Instead, use other wording.
- eg "We had previously assumed that the nature of the reaction was based on water.
- " Best wishes, Clive
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2 Answers
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Hi,
Here's my reaction to this.
Piling together a lot of these compound modifiers in front of a noun usually just results in English that is imprecise, unclear, inelegant and unnatural.
Instead, use other wording.
eg "We had previously assumed that the nature of the reaction was based on water. Now we had to change this conception."
Best wishes, Clive
Here's my reaction to this.
Piling together a lot of these compound modifiers in front of a noun usually just results in English that is imprecise, unclear, inelegant and unnatural.
Instead, use other wording.
eg "We had previously assumed that the nature of the reaction was based on water. Now we had to change this conception."
Best wishes, Clive
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I don't disagree with Clive at all. However, I did want to make a brief comment on your original post. One of the quirks on this guide to hyphenation is that you don't use a hyphen with adverbs ending in -ly, thus your "previously assumed" would not have the hyphen. If you do end up with a sitution in which there is more than one, use the hyphen before each and separate them with a comma (
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