#Em dash copy how to#

#Em dash copy how to#

It indicates you’re a strong writer who has a firm grasp on punctuation-and who knows how to use it to her advantage. The em dash can take your writing from everyday “ehh” to super sophisticated.

The most versatile punctuation mark there is and my go-to solution for lightening up sentences that are overladen with commas, I am a thorough believer the em dash is one of the best things to happen to the English language. If I liked sliced bread, I might even go so far as to say the em dash is the best thing since sliced bread-but, as a writer, I naturally hate clichés, and, as an Italian, I prefer my bread come in massive, unsliced, fresh-baked loaves…so we’ll scrap that one for now. To generate an em dash on a PC: hold down alt+0151 (only the numbers on the numeric keypad work for this-not the numbers above the letters on your keyboard)

To generate an em dash on a Mac: option + shift + the hyphen key Then, once I’m done writing, I go back through and do a “find and replace.” You can also use the following keyboard shortcuts: If I’m working on a platform that doesn’t auto-generate an em dash, I simply use two hyphens throughout the doc (like this - ) wherever I want an em dash. iMessages and Microsoft Word both do-Google docs, though, doesn’t (at least as of yet-maybe they’ll change their minds once they read this post. PRO TIP: Not all programs automatically give you an em dash when you type two minus signs (or hyphens). To generate an em dash in Word, simply hit the minus key twice, and then hit the spacebar, and-voila!-the two dashes will turn into one long em dash. I feel like this is leading me into a “When two dashes love each other…” bit.