英語基礎第五堂Hyphens"-"

究竟係extra curricular activities, 定係extra-curricular activities??
答案係下面開估

Hyphens係英文上既用法主要分為6種:

1) Fractions must be hyphenated:
    Two-thirds(三分之二)

2) Most words that begin with prefixes like ex,anti,non and neo are hyphenated.
    e.g. non-combatant, non-violent

3) Some titles
    e.g. Vice-president

4) To avoid ambiguities(意思不明確)
    e.g.1a) little-used car(少用的車)
          1b) little used-car(小的二手車)

          2a) extra curricular activities(更多課程上的活動，more work!!(inside curricular))
          2b) extra-curricular activities(課外活動，outside curricular, eg. playing basketball)

5) Re-words:
    e.g. He recovered/re-covered his sofa.
    e.g. Pupils should be taught how to re-present/represent information in different forms(present again/報告)
    e.g. Re-sign/Resign(續約/辭職)

6) Adjectives formed from two or more words
    e.g. balance-of-payments difficulties
    e.g. fifty-one-year-old people(如果無左hyphens，人地可能以為係50個1歲既人)
    e.g. I went to look at the state-of-the-art gallery.

Hyphens既功用是很強大的，我地應多加留意。