Open, hyphenated, or closed? Usage guides, dictionaries, and style manuals may differ in their treatment of the following words, so there’s not necessarily one right answer — except for the purposes of this exercise: Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary. All terms in this list are treated as open compounds. Which ones should be left as is, and which should be hyphenated or closed, and in which usages? The correct forms according to Merriam-Webster are listed at the bottom of the page.

1. Air borne
2. Anti social
3. Audio visual
4. Back log
5. Blood pressure
6. Book keeping
7. Bull’s eye
8. By law
9. Catch all
10. Check book
11. Child like
12. Clearing house
13. Court martial
14. Crew neck
15. Cross reference
16. Dog sled
17. Father land
18. Far reaching
19. First hand
20. Free style
21. Freeze dried
22. Fresh water
23. Go between
24. Great uncle
25. Half brother
26. High school
27. Higher ups
28. House hold
29. Inter agency
30. Key word
31. Jewel like
32. Land mass
33. Life size
34. Light year
35. Long term
36. Lower case
37. Main frame
38. Mass produced
39. Mid week
40. Mother ship
41. Multi purpose
42. Near collision
43. North west
44. Off shore
45. On site
46. Over supply
47. Pine cone
48. Pipe line
49. Policy maker
50. Post war
51. Pre existing
52. President elect
53. Pro life
54. Pseudo intellectual
55. Quasi realistic
56. Real time
57. Record breaker
58. River bed
59. Sea coast
60. Self control
61. Semi final
62. Shell like
63. Six pack
64. Snow melt
65. Socio economics
66. Step mother
67. Stomach ache
68. Strong hold
69. Toll free
70. Two fold
71. Under water
72. Vice president
73. Wild life
74. World wide
75. Year round

Answers

1. Airborne
2. Antisocial
3. Audiovisual
4. Backlog
5. Blood pressure (in the dictionary, so never hyphenate, except when combined with another adjective, as in “high-blood-pressure medication”)
6. Bookkeeping
7. Bull’s-eye
8. Bylaw
9. Catchall
10. Checkbook
11. Childlike
12. Clearinghouse
13. Court-martial
14. Crew neck (in the dictionary, so never hyphenate)
15. Cross-reference
16. Dogsled
17. Fatherland
18. Far-reaching
19. Firsthand
20. Freestyle
21. Freeze-dried
22. Freshwater
23. Go-between
24. Great-uncle
25. Half brother (in the dictionary, so never hyphenate)
26. High school (in the dictionary, so never hyphenate)
27. Higher-ups
28. Household
29. Interagency
30. Keyword
31. Jewel-like (because of the collision of two ls)
32. Landmass
33. Life-size
34. Light-year
35. Long term (hyphenate only when the phrase modifies a following noun)
36. Lowercase
37. Mainframe
38. Mass-produced
39. Midweek
40. Mother ship (in the dictionary, so never hyphenate)
41. Multipurpose
42. Near collision (hyphenate only when the phrase modifies a following noun)
43. Northwest
44. Offshore
45. On-site
46. Oversupply
47. Pinecone
48. Pipeline
49. Policymaker (not in the dictionary, but other -maker constructions, such as winemaker, are closed; if it looks wrong, leave it open)
50. Postwar
51. Preexisting
52. President-elect
53. Pro-life
54. Pseudo-intellectual (not in the dictionary, bust pseudo- constructions in which the second word starts with a vowel, such as pseudo-event, are hyphenated; those in which the second word starts with a consonant, such as pseudopod, are closed)
55. Quasirealistic (not in the dictionary, but most quasi- constructions, such as quasiperiodic, are closed; it if it looks wrong, hyphenate it)
56. Real time (hyphenate only when the phrase modifies a following noun)
57. Record breaker (not in the dictionary, but all other compounds with breaker, such as “circuit breaker,” are open)
58. Riverbed
59. Seacoast
60. Self-control
61. Semifinal
62. Shell-like (hyphenate only because of the collision of the ls)
63. Six-pack
64. Snowmelt
65. Socioeconomics
66. Stepmother
67. Stomachache
68. Stronghold
69. Toll free (hyphenate when the phrase modifies a following noun)
70. Twofold (but hyphenate with a number, as in 10-fold)
71. Underwater
72. Vice president (always open, though other compounds containing vice, such as vice-regent and viceroy, are treated differently)
73. Wildlife
74. Worldwide
75. Year-round

Scoring guide

0-25 correct: Always look it up.
26-50 correct: Always look it up.
51-75 correct: Always look it up.

Many common words and phrases are identical except for a strategic letter space — apart and “a part” come to mind — and though knowing which form to use in a sentence is often obvious (as in that example), the difference can be subtle. Here are some of the less clear-cut pairs:

1. Ahold/a hold: Ahold is a variant of the noun hold, used in such sentences as “I’ll get ahold of you later.” But when you mean to refer to an actual grip on something, use two words: “She really has a hold on you.” If it’s hard to decide which form to employ, try this test: If you can insert an adjective between a and hold, the two-word form is appropriate.

2. Already/all ready: Use the former when you need an adverb, as in “I told you already.” The latter form is correct in sentences such as “We’re all ready for the party.”

3. Alot/a lot: These two forms are interchangeable except in one significant respect: The one-word version is wrong. It is used often in informal writing and may one day be standard, but until you get the official memo, refrain from using it if you want to be taken seriously as a writer.

4. Alright/all right: See item number 3.

5. Altogether/all together: The one-word form, an adverb, suffices to mean “completely” or “in total,” as in “Altogether, we saved $100 on the deal.” (It also means “nude” in the idiomatic phrase “in the altogether.”) The phrase is appropriate for sentences such as “We are all together in this.”

6. Anybody/any body: The on-word form is a pronoun used in such constructions as “He doesn’t get along with anybody.” The two-word adjective-noun form is applicable in limited contexts, such as in the sentence “Any body in motion responds to gravity.”

7. Anymore/any more: The one-word form is used as an adverb in sentences such as “We don’t go there anymore”; the two-word form consists of the adjective any and the noun more, as in “I just can’t eat any more of that pie.”

8. Anyone/any one: The one-word form is a pronoun, synonymous with anybody, used as in “Anyone can make that claim.” “Any one” consists of the adjective any and the noun one, as in “Any one of you might be next.”

9. Anyplace/any place: The adverb anyplace is a synonym for anywhere: “She won’t let me go anyplace without her.” The latter usage is an adjective-and-noun phrase that describes a location: “He doesn’t want to go to any place he can’t smoke.”

10. Anything/any thing: Anything is the likely usage: “I don’t remember anything.” The two-word adjective-noun form is generally separated by an another adjective: “She’s just does any little thing she wants.”

11. Anytime/any time: To describe with what frequency something might occur, use the one-word adverbial form: “Stop by anytime.” The two-word adjective-noun form is preceded by the word at: “You may leave at any time.”

12. Anyway/any way: Anyway is a synonym for anyhow: “We didn’t want to go anyway.” The two-word adjective-noun form is preceded by the word in: “That doesn’t change the results in any way.”

13. Awhile/a while: The noun phrase “a while” and the adverb awhile are virtually interchangeable in a sentence, though you should precede the two-word form with the word for: “I think I’ll sit here for a while” and “I think I’ll sit here awhile” mean the same thing.

14. Cannot/can not: Cannot is virtually the only proper alternative. The second usage is wrong except in the correct awkward construction in the sentence “I can not go,” meaning “I can decide not to go.”

15. Everyday/every day: The one-word form is an adjective meaning “ordinary,” used to describe something usual as in “These are my everyday clothes.” The two-word phrase, an adverb, is used in such sentences as “I go there every day” to explain how something is done.

16. Everyone/every one: To refer to everybody, use one word: “Everyone’s a critic.” To emphasize a single individual or item, use two words: “Every one of them is broken.”

17. Everything/every thing: Everything is the default choice: “You’ve ruined everything.” The two-word adjective-noun form is usually divided by an additional adjective: “Every little thing she does is magic.”

18. Maybe/may be: The first choice is an alternative to the adverb perhaps; the second is a verb phrase used in such sentences as “It may be that she was right after all.”

19. Overtime/over time: As one word, this means word done beyond a regular shift: “I’ve worked overtime several days this week.” As two words, it refers to the passage of time: “Over time, we’ve seen dramatic changes.”

20. Sometime/some time: The one-word form is an adverb describing vagueness about when something will happen, as in “I’ll get around to it sometime.”

Have you noticed how many terms for musical phenomena have been adopted into general discourse? Sometimes it’s difficult to determine whether the musical term was later associated with a general definition, or whether the general usage came first, but take note of these musically derived or related words:

1. Ad lib (from ad libitum): an improvisation
2. Baroque: elaborate, extravagant, and/or flamboyant
3. Beat: a brief measure or pause
4. Cadence: a sequence or measure of rhythm
5. Choir: a group of people sharing beliefs or values (“preaching to the choir”)
6. Chord: the target of a stimulus (“strike a chord”)
7. Chorus: a unified response (“a chorus of approval”)
8. Coda: a conclusion
9. Conductor: someone who organizes an enterprise or scheme
10. Crescendo: a high point
11. Cue: a signal to start or do something or cause it to happen
12. Downbeat: pessimistic
13. Duet: an action undertaken by a union of two people
14. Encore: an additional performance or achievement
15. Ensemble: a group in which no one person stands out
16. Falsetto: an unnaturally high voice
17. Fanfare: celebratory attention
18. Finale: a concluding performance or act
19. Gig: a job or assignment
20. Impromptu: spontaneous, improvised
21. Interlude: a planned interruption or intervening period
22. Leitmotif: a recurring overarching idea
23. Maestro: an accomplished person
24. Medley: a series or other collection of ingredients or actions
25. Opera: extended to “soap opera,” the slang term for domestic radio and later television dramas (so called because detergent manufacturers often sponsored these programs aimed at homemakers) and “horse opera,” another name for westerns (plural of opus)
26. Opus: a major work
27. Orchestrate: to organize strategically, with a possible connotation of conniving or conspiracy
28. Overtone: a suggestion or connotation
29. Overture: an invitation or act of persuasion
30. Pitch: the nature of a sound based on its frequency, or a degree of interest (“fever pitch”)
31. Prelude: a preliminary to a main action
32. Prologue: an introduction
33. Reprise: a repeated performance
34. Requiem: a composition in any medium to honor the dead or a failed effort
35. Resonance: an evocation of feeling or sense
36. Rhapsodic: any overwrought or elaborate creative effort or speech (“waxing rhapsodic”)
37. Riff: a verbal performance, especially as in a fast and furious routine by a stand-up comedian; also refers to a brief witticism or to a variation, synonymous with the informal noun take
38. Rock: to be very impressive or pleasing (“That rocks!”), to inspire excitement (“The band rocked the concert hall”), or to flaunt an ostentatious style of clothing or coiffure (“She rocked her new boots”)
39. Serenade: an effort to persuade
40. Solo: alone
41. Staccato: a suggestion of speed rather than simply detached sounds (“staccato bursts of gunfire”)
42. Suite: a collection or set
43. Tempo: speed or rate
44. Theme: subject or style
45. Timbre: the distinguishing quality of a voice
46. Tone: the quality of expression in writing or speaking as well, and the quality of a physical form
47. Unison: agreement or union
48. Upbeat: optimistic
49. Virtuoso: one particularly skilled in an endeavor
50. Waltz: to move in a bold, confident, or lively manner (“She triumphantly waltzed into the room”)

Modifying phrases intended to provide clarity can be counterproductive if placed in the wrong position in a sentence. Repair the improper installation of modifiers in the following sentences, then compare your solutions with my revisions at the bottom of the page:

1. “Joseph Priestley began to suspect that air was not a simple substance while he was at Leeds.”

2. “It was under these conditions that Protestantism was introduced to Europe, a branch of Christianity that declared public festivities sinful and vulgar and convinced large numbers of people that their lives should be spent on disciplined labor and worship.”

3. “He had accumulated millions of dollars there that couldn’t be taken out of the country according to rules established after the war ended.”

4. “I already had a number of books and comics under my belt I had drawn with my brother.”

5. “A list of states with the highest past-year rates of driving while under the influence of alcohol among adults ages 18 or older follow.”

Answers and Explanations

1. As organized, this sentence implies that the scientist limited his doubts about air’s composition to the time he spent in Leeds, rather than stating that his suspicion began during his time there. To clarify the sentence, move the modifying phrase to the head of the sentence, and, for good measure, change the tense of the second verb, because air’s substantive nature has not changed since Priestley’s lifetime: “While he was at Leeds, Joseph Priestley began to suspect that air is not a simple substance.”

2. Because Europe is the noun immediately preceding the gloss, a reader might assume that the gloss defines Europe, rather than Protestantism, the correct subject of the definition. To eliminate that ambiguity, move the reference to the continent to the end of the sentence so that the definition is a mid-sentence parenthetical: “It was under these conditions that Protestantism, a branch of Christianity that declared public festivities sinful and vulgar and convinced large numbers of people that their lives should be spent on disciplined labor and worship, was introduced to Europe.”

3. This sentence is not egregiously incorrect, but the phrase beginning with according seems to modify country. It would be easier to read — and the most essential information would effectively be reserved for the end of the sentence — with the phrase inserted as a parenthetical: “He had accumulated millions of dollars there that, according to rules established after the war ended, couldn’t be taken out of the country.”

4. As constructed, this sentence implies that the writer and his brother had collaborated on drawing a belt, under which a number of books and comics were kept. The phrase “under my belt” should be shifted closer to the head of the sentence: “I already had under my belt a number of books and comics I had drawn with my brother.”

5. This painfully contracted sentence needs to be relaxed. The impetus to avoid a weak “to be” form of a verb is admirable, but it is awkward for that verb to be located at the very end, after a confusingly extensive subject. It would be better to immediately state the location of the list, then uncoil the tightly wound phrase identifying the subject of the list: “The following is a list of states with the highest rates of adults ages 18 or older who drove within the last year while under the influence of alcohol.” This is a rare instance in which the modifying phrase (in this case, the subject of the list) is more effectively placed at the end of the sentence, rather than inserted somewhere in its midst.

Humorous works of fiction are easily enlivened when the author resorts to one or more of the following categories of playing with prose:

1. Acronyms: An acronym is an abbreviation consisting of a string of initial letters pronounced as a word. Fictional examples, such as SPECTRE (for “Special Executive for Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge, and Extortion”), from the James Bond novels and films, and VILE (for “Villains’ International League of Evil”), from the Carmen Sandiego computer-game series, can be serious or humorous depending on formation and intent.

2. Anagrams: An anagram is simply a word with its letters scrambled in a new order. Many humorous phrases have been derived by scrambling expressions or people’s names, such as forming “I am a weakish speller” from “William Shakespeare.” (Anagram generators can be found on the Internet.)

3. Chronograms: A chronogram is a phrase in which constituent letters also express a number, as in “My Day Closed Is In Immortality,” an epitaph for England’s Queen Elizabeth I in which the first letter of each word corresponds to a Roman numeral; the numerical sequence, MDCIII, is translated as 1603, the date of her death. A weak variant is a habit of filmmakers (or, more accurately, film marketers) of replacing one or more letters in a movie title with a number vaguely resembling the letter or otherwise related, as in the title of the 1995 crime thriller Seven, represented on posters as Se7en.

4. Initialisms: Initialisms are distinguished from acronyms by the fact that the constituent letters are pronounced individually, rather than sequentially sounded as if they were a single word. Many popular social-networking terms such as LOL (“laugh out loud”) and ROTFL (“roll on the floor laughing”) are initialisms; so is TEOTWAWKI (“the end of the world as we know it”).

5. Lipograms: A lipogram is a composition deliberately consisting of words lacking a letter of the alphabet. Such a work is more or less easily accomplished depending on the letter selected for omission; many writers, astonishingly, have written novels produced without recourse to use of a common letter such as e or t.

6. Malapropisms: This type of wordplay refers to misuse of one word for another by those too ignorant to recognize the error. It’s named after Mrs. Malaprop, a character in an eighteenth-century play who is notorious for such unwitting utterances, as exemplified by the character’s line “She’s as headstrong as an allegory on the banks of Nile.” Shakespeare also employed such humor, most notably in lines by the character Dogberry in Much Ado About Nothing such as “Our watch, sir, have indeed comprehended two auspicious persons.”

7. Mondegreens: Misunderstood song lyrics are often referred to as mondegreens; the term itself is based on a mishearing of the phrase “laid him on the green.” A more recent example is “Excuse me while I kiss this guy,” rather than “Excuse me while I kiss the sky,” from the Jimi Hendrix song “Purple Haze.”

8. Onomatopoeias: Onomatopoeias (the term is from the Greek words for “make” and “name”) are words that imitate sounds, such as splash or bump. A notable example of an onomatopoeic proper name is that of the Houyhnhnms, the sentient, civilized horses from Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels.

9. Portmanteaus: Portmanteaus, words creating by combining two words and their meanings into one, were named and popularized by Lewis Carroll. He coined several, such as slithy (from lithe and slimy); more recent examples include brunch and smog. (Carroll named the form of wordplay after a word for a suitcase with two separate compartments.)

10. Spoonerisms: The term for expressions in which initial letters, or sometimes entire syllables or words, are transposed is based on the name of a British clergyman supposedly prone to such utterances, though many attributed to him were only inspired by him. Among them is “a well-boiled icicle” for “a well-oiled bicycle”; John Lennon is credited with coining a variation on “Time heals all wounds”: “Time wounds all heels.”