✍️ A Few Words about Em-dashes – and Why AI Can Suck It
or, How in this Case, I Actually *Am* Raging against the Machine…
It seems like every conversation I have with people about AI has to be prefaced with, “I’m not a Luddite, but...” Usually, that’s followed by a 17-point argument that would indicate to most sane people that I am, in fact, a Luddite.
I’m not going to waste precious words here discussing AI other than to say that I’ve understood for years how AI can be a useful tool, but I don’t trust the people behind the AI. That includes how they get their (my) data and how they use it.
What I want to talk about today is how my beloved em-dash seems to be collateral damage in the rise of AI. As you’ve likely heard by now, there’s quite the kerfuffle around the em-dash vis à vis AI.
Regardless, I find the em-dash to be one of the most useful tools in the English language.
For example, you can use it to make an aside – an extra dash of flavour – with minimal interruption to the main thought. You can use it to emphasize a point – without having to type shouty-shouty ALL-CAPS or waste eye-catching bolding. (I have better uses for bolding…) You can use the em-dash to join two related thoughts together – maybe a semi-colon would do just as well, but it’s not quite as conversational, is it? You can use it to indicate an afterthought – at least, that’s the theory.
Now here’s where it gets interesting*. I don’t use an em-dash at all. I actually use an en-dash (two joined hypens instead of three) – and I use it with spaces around it. This format just makes more sense to me, and never more so than in our Internet world. I recently learned – as in, the last week or so – that the en-dash with spaces is the standard in UK English (with some exceptions). The em-dash without spaces is the American style (with some exceptions).
As usual, the rules around the Canadian style are murky. However, the rule for times when there aren’t any definitive rules is to default to the UK rules. (Often, there aren’t any set-in-stone rules… One of my dream jobs is to get a contract with the Department of Canadian Heritage to create definitive Canadian grammar rules. Know anyone there?)
Where you could deduct points from me is that I generally spell “em-dash” and “en-dash” with a hyphen. This isn’t commonly the convention, but again, it makes sense to me. After all, how do you talk about em-dashes without, well, a dash?
What is really worrying to me though is that I’ve heard of writers explicitly being told by clients not to use an em-dash “because people will think the text is AI-generated”. I haven’t personally experienced this, but I figure it’s only a matter of time.
AI hasn’t affected my personal writing one iota, though. I won’t let it. To drop the em-dash – well, that would mean going against the very core of who I am as a writer – and maybe as a person.
Besides, I have to keep up my Luddite cred.
Key Takeaway: Em-dashes are extremely useful, and I’m not going to let AI taint them for me – or my writing.
Over to You
What are your thoughts on the em-dash? Have you slowed or stopped your own use of em-dashes because of AI? Let us know in the comments below!
Until next time, keep writing with wild abandon!
~Graham
*Some would say em-dashes are inherently uninteresting. All I can say is, fair enough.
email me if you get lost.
I am a lover, perhaps over-user, of the em dash, and I fear that it is the canary in the AI collateral damage coal mine. (Apologies for the mixed metaphor.) Inevitably, publishers wanting to filter out submissions written by AI will follow in the footsteps of universities and begin using AI tools to detect AI writing, and given the bias and flawed nature of AI systems, a growing number of writers will suffer unfounded accusations and ill-advised rejections. I don’t know that I’ve been a victim of overzealous anti-AI slush pile readers or overzealous AI-based AI writing detectors—I don’t know, but I do worry. I worry that my typical writing style—semiformal, mostly complete sentences, not particularly conversational in tone, and lots of em dashes—is the kind of style that is susceptible to such false accusations. My response is to try to not worry about it, and instead focus on continually crafting and discovering my own voice, and trying to sound more like me each day.
By the way, I highly recommend this article about the collateral damage: https://marcusolang.substack.com/p/im-kenyan-i-dont-write-like-chatgpt.
I use em-dashes, not frequently but sometimes. I had no idea that some people associate them with AI generated writing. Too bad for them! If some are considered Luddites re use of AI, I'm in the stone age.