說明文中的破折號 「—」
上星期，我收到母校哈佛大學發給校友的電郵，內容講述大學現在面臨一些新的政治壓力，以及應對這些壓力的方法。 作為一篇說明文— 一種以事實、邏輯和清晰的結構來解釋或澄清主題的寫作類型，這封電郵在需要額外解釋的地方使用了大量「em-dashes (長破折號)」。 （我在這段的英文版中也用了。） 「Em-dash」（較長的破折號「—」，有時或輸入為兩個短破折號「--」）是英文標點符號的一種，與短破折號（en-dash）「-」和連字符 (hyphen)（同樣是「-」）有分別的。 就標點符號的使用慣例而言，「hyphen」會用來連接單字作為一組，例如「mother-in-law」、「high-quality」等。較短的「en-dash」則用來表示幅度或連繫，例如「Monday-Friday」。但我們暫不討論這兩種標點了，大家有興趣的話可改天再談。 今天我想集中講一下長破折號「em-dash」。 「em-dash」經常被使用在說明文中，特別是當我們想要添加額外的解釋時，這種解釋在結構上完全獨立於它所在的句子（即它不用在結構上符合它所在的句子位置），但同時又延續了相關思想或論點的邏輯。 如果你有經常閱讀我的通訊，也可能注意到我是很喜歡在說明文中使用「em-dash」來制造「解釋性停頓」的。🙂 以下例子節錄自開始時提及的電郵： The administration’s prescription goes beyond the power of the federal government. It violates Harvard’s First Amendment rights and exceeds the statutory limits of the government’s authority under Title VI. And it threatens our values as a private institution devoted to the pursuit, production, and dissemination of knowledge. No government—regardless of which party is in power—should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue. 被標記的句子原本是： No government should dictate what private universities can teach. 主語是名詞組「no government」，限定動詞是「should dictate」。 然而作者（現任大學校長Alan M. Garber）想在主語「no government」後面添加額外的要點，進一步解釋「no government」的意思是「no government regardless of political party」— 即無論哪個政黨執政，這說法都是對的。 在這種句流中加入「em-dash」時，它們會成對出現，一個在附加解釋的前面，一個緊跟在後，從而形成停頓。視覺上，這對破折號讓我們可以清楚認出這個與句子其餘部分分開的是個「題外話」，而原本句子的結構會在其後延續。 假如「em-dash」剛好是加在句子中最後一個字的後面，那當然就只會出現一個破折號而非一對。（就如上一段的最後。） 「em-dash」顯示的「附加解釋」可以是任何一種文法結構 — 一個單字、一個名詞組、一個子句，甚至是另一組句子。因為它在結構上是完全獨立於所在句子的其餘部分，只是延續了它的意思邏輯而已。 再看看剛才的例子： No government—regardless of which party is in power—should dictate what private universities can teach. 在兩個「em-dash」之間的部分是一個由「regardless」開始的副詞組，它亦包括嵌入式名詞子句「which party is in power」。 這裡用「em-dash」加入這額外副詞組，相比起用「comma」加入，給讀者的感覺會是更「迫切地」表達這意思，因為好像是，原本在句子中並沒有想加入的，但開始說後，覺得不能不表達這額外解釋，所以就用「em-dash」加插在中間。 而在同一電郵中又有另一個例子，兩個「em-dash」之間的「附加說明」則只是一個普通的名詞： Our motto—Veritas, or truth—guides us as we navigate the challenging path ahead. Seeking truth is a journey without end. It requires us to be open to new information and different perspectives, to subject our beliefs to ongoing scrutiny, and to be ready to change our minds. It compels us to take up the difficult work of acknowledging our flaws so that we might realize the full promise of the University, especially when that promise is threatened. 我們的校訓——Veritas，也就是「真理」——在我們踏上前方艱鉅道路時，為我們指引方向。追尋真理是一段沒有終點的旅程，它要求我們對新資訊和不同觀點保持開放，持續檢視自己的信念，並準備好改變想法。它迫使我們勇敢面對自身的缺失，好讓我們能夠實現大學的真正承諾，尤其在這承諾受到威脅的時候。 這裡的原句只是「our motto guides us as we navigate the challenging path ahead」，而作者選擇使用「em-dash」來提醒讀者「motto（校訓）」是甚麼。 用「em-dash」來提醒讀者校訓的內容，也是一個值得討論的寫作選擇。假如這文章是針對一般大眾的，作者可能會選擇將校訓作為句子主語的一部分，以便讀者知道它是甚麼，例如： Our motto “Veritas,” or “Truth,” guides us… 但這封郵件是發給學校校友的，應該是知道校訓內容的，因此作者選擇直接寫： Our motto guides us… 這句話中，「em-dash」之間的「附加解釋」，除了提醒校友們校訓的內容，更能強調出「truth」一詞的分量。也就是說，使用「em-dash」與否，很多時候都取決於寫作風格。 總之，當我們想要在說明文的句流中加入額外的解釋，「em-dash」是非常有用的。它可以讓我們在順應原句思維邏輯的同時，又暫時跳脫本身句子的結構。 你也試試，能否在本星期發現更多例子吧！ |
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The Em-dash “—” in Expository Writing I received an email sent to alumni from my alma mater Harvard University last week about some new political pressures the university is facing and how it is handling them. As a piece of expository writing-—a type of writing that explains or clarifies a topic with facts, logic, and a clear structure—the email used a lot of ”em-dashes” throughout, at points that required extra explanation. (I just used two in this sentence also.) The “em-dash” (the longer dash “—” or sometimes typed as two short dashes “--”) is a punctuation mark that is typographically distinguished from the shorter “en-dash” (“-”) and the “hyphen” (also “-”). Briefly, in terms of punctuation convention, the “hyphen” is used to join words together, like “mother-in-law,” “high-quality” etc. The shorter “en-dash” is used to show ranges or connections, for example, writing out “Monday-Friday” etc. We won’t discuss these two punctuation marks here. We can discuss them another time. I would like to discuss the longer “em-dash” today. The “em-dash” is used frequently in expository writing, specifically when we need to add in an extra bit of explanation that is structurally completely separate from the sentence it is in but continues the logical flow of the ideas or argument. If you read my newsletters closely, you might have noticed that I am also very fond of using the “em-dash” to create “explanatory pauses” in my expository writing. 🙂 Here is one example from the email I mentioned: The administration’s prescription goes beyond the power of the federal government. It violates Harvard’s First Amendment rights and exceeds the statutory limits of the government’s authority under Title VI. And it threatens our values as a private institution devoted to the pursuit, production, and dissemination of knowledge. No government—regardless of which party is in power—should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue. The highlighted sentence is originally: No government should dictate what private universities can teach. The subject is the noun phrase “no government,” and the finite verb is “should dictate.” However, the writer (the current President of the university, Alan M. Garber) wanted to add an an extra point right after the subject “no government” to further elaborate that “no government” means “no government regardless of political party”—as in, this statement is true no matter which political party is in power. When “em-dashes” are added within the flow of a sentence like this, they come in pairs, with one in front of the extra explanation and one right after, creating a pause. Visually, this pair of dashes help us see clearly that the part that is separated from the rest of the sentence is an “aside,” and that the structure of the sentence continues after it. When the “em-dash” happens to be added after the last word of a sentence, however, there would only be one, of course. (Like at the end of the last last paragraph.) Now, the “explanatory aside” indicated by “em-dashes” can be anything in terms of grammatical structure—a single word, a noun phrase, a clause, or even another sentence. It can be anything because it is completely separated from the rest of the sentence it is in structurally, even though it continues the logical flow. For example, let’s look at the example above again: No government—regardless of which party is in power—should dictate what private universities can teach. Here, the part between the “em-dashes” happens to be an adverb phrase with an embedded noun clause, “which party is in power,” inside. Using “em-dashes” to insert this additional adverbial phrase here instead of commas gives readers a sense of more urgent emphasis. It feels as though the speaker hadn't originally planned to include it in the sentence, but once they began speaking, they felt it simply had to be said—so they inserted this explanation midstream with an em-dash. In this other example from the same email, however, the “aside” between “em-dashes” is only a simple noun: Our motto—Veritas, or truth—guides us as we navigate the challenging path ahead. Seeking truth is a journey without end. It requires us to be open to new information and different perspectives, to subject our beliefs to ongoing scrutiny, and to be ready to change our minds. It compels us to take up the difficult work of acknowledging our flaws so that we might realize the full promise of the University, especially when that promise is threatened. 我們的校訓——Veritas，也就是「真理」——在我們踏上前方艱鉅道路時，為我們指引方向。追尋真理是一段沒有終點的旅程，它要求我們對新資訊和不同觀點保持開放，持續檢視自己的信念，並準備好改變想法。它迫使我們勇敢面對自身的缺失，好讓我們能夠實現大學的真正承諾，尤其在這承諾受到威脅的時候。 The sentence here is originally just “our motto guides us as we navigate the challenging path ahead.” The “em-dashes” allow the writer to remind readers what the “motto” is. The choice here of using “em-dashes” to remind readers of the motto is an interesting stylistic point to discuss also. If this piece of writing were targeted at the general public, the writer might have chosen to just include the motto as part of the subject of the sentence so that readers would know what it is, like: Our motto “Veritas,” or “Truth,” guides us… However, because the email is sent to alumni of the school, who should already know what the school motto is, the writer chose to just write the sentence as: Our motto guides us… Within this sentence, the “aside” within “em-dashes” is added both to remind alumni of what the motto is and also to further emphasize the weight of the word “truth.” This shows that whether or not “em-dashes” are used is often a stylistic choice also. In sum, when we need to add in extra explanations within the flow of a sentence in our expository writing, “em-dashes” are very useful. They allow us to keep the logical flow of the ideas while briefly jumping away from the structure of the sentence we are writing. Try to see if you can find more examples in your own reading this week! |
Best,
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