Just as the humble apostrophe suffers, so does the poor hyphen.
The hyphen is an essential punctuation mark and often misused or abused. The trend today is towards cleaner punctuation than we were used to in the past. Therefore, we have now said goodbye (formerly good-bye) to words such as e-mail, web-site and on-line. Using hyphens in those words would make you appear to be very old-fashioned nowadays (or, fifty years ago, now-a-days).
Why the hyphen in old-fashioned? Because it means 'fashioned in an old way', not that the person is necessarily old. We see that type of hyphen frequently in menus and its usage is correct. For example:
Pan-seared (seared in a pan)
Rosemary-infused (infused with rosemary)
Hyphens, if correctly used, help us to make our copy understandable. A frequently-used example is this; what is a slippery eel salesman? A chap who sells slippery eels or a chap who is less than honest? Add the humble hyphen, and the meaning is clear - a slippery-eel salesman becomes your man if purchasing eels is on your to-do list today. (And a todo list would look pretty silly).
What is a dish of black and white beans? Are they beans where each individual bean is both black and white? Or is it a mixture of black beans and white beans? If the former, bring on the hyphen and black-and-white beans makes everything clear.
What has the humble apostrophe ever done to you?
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