Jennifer: Hello, everybody, welcome to my channel Sparkle
English where I teach you how to improve your level of
English. If you haven't already, make sure to
subscribe to my channel for more videos on how to improve
your English writing skills, English reading skills,
pronunciation and more. Today's video is a highly
requested video. It is a part of my English writing
essential series. And I'm going to teach you about basic
hyphen rules. So you know when to use hyphens when you're
writing in English. So let's get started. A hyphen is a
punctuation mark that we use to join words or parts of
words. This right here is a hyphen. Now in order to
understand the importance of hyphens, let's read this
sentence here together, we need hyphens because working
24 hour shifts is not the same as working 24 hour shifts, or
24 hour shifts. What exactly does that mean? You can see
here that we have used the hyphen differently. In all
three examples, the first one, twenty four-hour shifts, what
this would mean, would be that there would be 20 shifts. And
if you don't know what a shift is, for example, if you work
at a restaurant and you have to work from nine to five,
that would be an eight hour shift. Okay, the first one,
twenty four-hour shifts would be 20 shifts of four hours. So
for example, working from 8am to 12pm. And the second one
twenty-four hour shifts would mean we're having 24 shifts
that were an hour long each 8am to 9am. And the last one
twenty-four-hour shifts would mean shifts that are literally
you working from 8am until 8am. For example, maybe if you
were a nurse or a doctor, working for 24 hours straight,
okay, so using hyphens is very important so it is clear what
you mean. And I'm going to teach you how to use hyphens
correctly. So let's continue. Hyphen rule 1a: Use a hyphen
to join two or more words that serve as a single adjective
before a noun. This is very important before a noun. For
example, a well-known actress, a kind-hearted man, a
brand-new phone, chocolate-covered pretzels. So
you can see in all of these, we are using a hyphen to
create these compound adjectives that are describing
the noun. Okay, so we have to use a hyphen to join these
words to make compound words or compound adjectives that
serve as a single adjective when it is before the noun.
Okay? Now, let's look at hyphen rule one be, when
compound modifiers come after a noun, they are not
hyphenated. And a compound modifier consists of two words
connected by a hyphen, which act together like one
adjective. You could also call it a compound adjective. She
was a well-known actress. That's correct because the
noun or the word we are modifying comes after the
compound adjective or the compound modifier. But if we
were to say the actress was well known, we would not put a
hyphen here, because the noun or the word we are modifying
comes before, okay, so we only need to use a hyphen when we
are creating a compound adjective that comes before
the noun. Okay? Another example, it is a dog-friendly
restaurant, or is the restaurant dog friendly? In
this first sentence, we would use a hyphen because we are
creating a compound adjectives before the noun. But in the
second example, because it comes after the noun, we do
not use a hyphen. Now hyphen rule to use a hyphen with
compound numbers, you should hyphenate compound numbers
between 21 and 99. Except, of course, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70,
80, and 90. A compound number is any number that consists of
two words. So let's look at some examples, thirty-three,
we use a hyphen to combine 30 and 3. Sixty-five,
eighty-two...
Now let's look at this in a sentence example. There are
twenty-one chickens on her farm. There were one hundred
and thirty-two people at the concert. We would not use a
hyphen for 100 because we're only hyphenated compound
numbers between 21 and 99. So what you would write it like
this, there were one hundred and thirty-two people at the
concert. Of course, you could also write it just like this:
one hundred and thirty-two. But in some cases, you have to
write the full number, you have to write it out instead
of writing the numerical value. And if you had to write
it out, you would write it out like that. Another example. He
was born in nineteen eighty-eight. Okay, so if you
had to write it out, that's how you would write it out.
And if you're just providing a numerical value in digits
1988. Okay, so you're only hyphenating the compound
numbers between 21 and 99. Hyphen rule 3: Use a hyphen
with the following prefixes. Now remember, there are
prefixes which come before a word, and suffixes which come
after a word. So with this rule, you have to use a hyphen
with the following prefixes, x, which means former or
before, self, and all. So I'm going to show you some
examples of this. My ex-boyfriend is Italian. Okay,
we have to use a hyphen after this prefix to combine the
prefix ex and the word boyfriend. The ex-mayor was a
caring woman. I wish I had more self-confidence. Why are
you so self-obsessed? Voldemort was an all-powerful
wizard. God is an all-knowing being. So you just have to
remember to use a hyphen with these prefixes ex, self and
all. Hyphen rule 4: Use a hyphen between a prefix and a
capitalized word. For example,
right now, there's a lot of talk going on about the
presidential election. And there's a lot of people who
are anti-Trump, or pro-Trump. And because this is a
capitalized word as a name, we have to use a hyphen between
any prefix and the capitalized word. Another example
pre-Civil War, this is always capitalized, so we have to use
a hyphen between the prefix and the capitalized word,
mid-October, post-World War Two. So let's look at some
sentence examples. My mom's birthday is in mid-August, the
world is a safer place to live post-World War Two. My
friend's uncle is pro-Trump, and he is not happy about the
election results. Okay, so these are just some examples
of how you would use a hyphen between a prefix and a
capitalized word. And finally hyphen rule five: use a hyphen
with hyphenated compound words. Again, a compound word
is formed when two words are combined to make a new word.
There are three types of compound words, closed-form,
open-form, and hyphenated. Today, we're only going to
talk about hyphenated compound words, and I'm going to give
you some examples. I will create a video fully
explaining compound words. But for a lot of these it's
memorization because words that used to be hyphenated,
for example, no longer are and that makes them a closed form
compound word. For example, email used to always be
written like this with a hyphen, but over time, it has
become a closed form compound word and is written like this.
So it used to be hyphenated. And now more and more people
are just writing it as a closed form, compound word.
Another example is teenager. Teenager used to be written
like this, but now it is written like this as a closed
form. compound word, okay. But today, we're just talking
about hyphenated compound words. So you can stay tuned
for a more in depth lesson on compound words in the future.
So some examples, brother-in-law, you would have
two hyphens in this word to combine that to make that one
word, in-laws, merry-go-round, runner-up. Okay? These are
some examples of hyphenated compound words. Okay, so now
that we've gone over the basic hyphen rules, it's time to
practice where do you need to place hyphens in these
sentences? I am in a long term relationship. Is it a warm
blooded animal? That author is well known. His ex girlfriend
was cruel. Susan is 32 years old. Shawn has a great mo
her in law. Dad's birthday is n mid April. We are going to
tay at an all inclusive hot l. So I want you to go thr
ugh this, maybe pause the vid o and write down where the hyp
ens should go in these sen ences or if you need to use
hyphens at all. And once you re ready, press play and we'
l go through the answers tog ther. Okay, so number one, I a
in a long-term rel tionship. Here we need to use
a hyphen between long and ter . And we need to use a hyp
en between long and term, bec use we are combining both of
hese words to make a com ound adjective to describe the
relationship. And again, rem mber, we only use a hyphen whe
it comes before the noun or he word that we are mod
fying. The second one: is it a warm-blooded animal? Ag
in, this is similar to the
previous example, we're describing the animal and
we're combining these two words to make a compound
adjective. It is a warm blooded animal. The next one,
that author is well known. Now this one is a little bit
trickier. With this one, we do not need to use a hyphen. If
we said that is a well-known author, then we would put a
hyphen, because remember, we only use a hyphen when it
comes before the noun or the word that we are describing.
The next one, his ex girlfriend was cruel. After
the prefix ex, we have to use hyphen, Susan is thirty-two y
ars old. Again, remember that we use a hyphen between 21 a
d 99. To make a compound numb r, Shawn has a great mothe
-in-law. Again, these are o e of the hyphenated words t
at I was talking about in ru e number five, hyphenate
compound words. And a lot of these are memorization, moth
r-in-law, father-in-law, broth r-in-law, sister-in-law, al
of these always need to be h phenated. Dad's birthday
is in mid-April. Here, we'r going to put a hyphen after m
d because remember, if the word that we're using after a
refix has a capital letter, e have to put a hyphen b
tween the prefix and the capit l letter. We are going to stay
at an all-inclusive hotel ag in, so we have to put a hyp
en, after all, after the pref xes all, ex, and self. Okay,
o I want you to let me know i the comments section ho
many you got correct out of e ght. And also try to practi
e creating or writing your own sentences using hyphens,
following any of the different rules that we outlined in this
video. I hope you learned som thing in this video and this
has made it a bit easier to nderstand how and when we u
e hyphens. If you have any que tions, you can ask your
uestion in the comments sectio of this video. Make sure
to subscribe to Sparkle nglish for more videos just l
ke this one and I will se you in