Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Note: some dictionaries will list "attorney generals" along with "attorneys general" as acceptable plurals of that office. Whether that's a matter of caving in to popular usage or an inability to determine the "significant word" is unknown. As a general rule, then, the plural form of an element in a hierarchical term belongs to the base element in the term, regardless of the base element's placement: first sergeants sergeants major sergeants first class colonel generals [Russian] lieutenant generals lieutenant colonels apprentice, journeyman, and master mechanics deputy librarians deputy assistant secretaries of state
The possessive of a hyphenated compound is created by attaching an apostrophe -s to the end of the compound itself: my daughter-in-law's car, a friend of mine's car. To create the possessive of pluralized and compounded forms, a writer is wise to avoid the apostrophe -s form and use an "of" phrase (the "post genitive") instead: the meeting of the daughters-in-law, the schedule of half-moons. Otherwise, the possessive form becomes downright weird: the daughters-in-law's meeting, friends of mine's cars. One of the most difficult decisions to make about possessives and plurals of compound words occurs when you can't decide whether the first noun in a compound structure is acting as a noun that ought to be showing possession or as what is called an attributive noun, essentially an adjective. In other words, do we write that I am going to a writers conference or to a writers' conference? The Chicago Style Manual suggests that if singular nouns can act as attributive nouns city government, tax relief then plural nouns should be able to act as attributive nouns: consumers group, teachers union. This principle is not universally endorsed, however, and writers must remember to be consistent within a document. This section does not speak to the matter of compounded nouns such as "Professor Villa's and Professor Darling's classes have been filled." See the section on Possessives for additional help.
Spelling
The following table presents a mini-dictionary of compound modifiers and nouns. Perhaps the best use of a very partial inventory like this is to suggest the kinds of words that a writer would be wise either to memorize or to be at least wary of. It is sometimes enough to know when we should get the dictionary off the shelf. 2-year education one-week vacation A-frame African American Air Force half sister high-level officials I-beam Italian-American Italian-American club
all-city tournament attorney general blood pressure blue-green dress bull's-eye database daughter-in-law English-speaking person ex-wife first-rate accommodations football grandmother grant-in-aid great-aunt
jack-in-the-box lifelike light year mayor-elect salesperson secretary-treasurer stockbroker T-square threefold up-to-the-minute V-formation vice president well-made clothes worldwide inflation X-ray
Notice that African American contains no hyphen, but Italian-American does. There are no hard and fast rules about this, and social conventions change. (There is no hyphen in French Canadian.) Some groups have insisted that they do not want to be known as "hyphenated Americans" and resist, therefore, the use of a hyphen, preferring that the word "American" be used as an adjective. Some resources even suggest that a term like Italian-American should be used only when the individual thus referred to has parents of two different nationalities. That's probably a stretch, but a writer must be aware that sensibilities can be aroused when using nationalities of any description. Consistency within a document is also important.
Suspended Compounds*
With a series of nearly identical compounds, we sometimes delay the final term of the final term until the last instance, allowing the hyphen to act as a kind of place holder, as in The third- and fourth-grade teachers met with the parents. Both full- and part-time employees will get raises this year. We don't see many 3-, 4-, and 5-year-old children around here.
Be careful not to overuse this feature of the hyphen; readers have to wait until that final instance to know what you're talking about, and that can be annoying.