I’m back from my January break and ready to start posting again.
Over my break I finally got my hands on the 18th edition of the Chicago Manual of Style (CMOS), and you know what the first section I visited was?
The hyphenation table at the end of chapter 7.
As a CMOS user for several years now, the hyphenation table is where I probably spend more time than anywhere else in the manual. This is the first new edition of CMOS that’s come out since I became an editor, so I was eager to see what (if anything) the folks at the Chicago press chose to change. So I put CMOS 17 and CMOS 18 side by side on my desk to directly compare these tables, and here’s what I learned.
Honestly, not much has changed. Going cell by cell, the tables contain the same guidelines for a while. Most of the examples are even retained. There are some minor new additions, but nothing’s been removed, and what has been added isn’t jaw-dropping.
For example, the “adjective + participle” guideline in section 2 (for words such as “lighthearted”) now says that some permanent compounds are closed and to check Merriam-Webster. This begins to pop up more often from here on out, but it’s not new advice and can be found in CMOS 17.
There’s a new section for adverbial phrases, which advises to hyphenate phrases such as “worked part-time” if M-W lists it as hyphenated, otherwise open it up. Again, nothing jaw-dropping.
A slight change can be found in section 3 where it gives advice on “e” compounds. It now advises to close more of these terms (“ebook” is now closed where it was previously hyphenated). It still says that other terms are hyphenated, but this is one example of words in our modern lexicon becoming more ubiquitous and permanent, which Chicago’s preference is to close up. My prediction is that the next edition will close up “e-commerce” as well.
Section 3 has several new additions. There are now entries for “first, second, third” compounds as well as “ill,” “odd,” and “then” compounds. The last notable thing that’s different is that “mid” compounds have been moved from section 4 to 3.
That’s pretty much the extent of changes to the CMOS hyphenation table for the 18th edition, so in my opinion anyone still using their 17th edition doesn’t need to worry too much about not having the most up-to-date table. I’m not surprised to learn that Chicago hasn’t made drastic changes to these guidelines, but I’m happy to know that for a fact now.
Next week’s post will discuss why all of this even matters. Check back for that.
Timothy