mishyphenate

mishyphenate

English

Etymology

mis- +‎ hyphenate

Verb

mishyphenate (third-person singular simple present mishyphenates, present participle mishyphenating, simple past and past participle mishyphenated)

1. To hyphenate a word at an inappropriate point, especially one that is not between two syllables.
   • 1988, Richard Rubinstein, Digital Typography, page 187:

     Good hyphenators strongly prefer Type II errors over Type I; they find fewer possibilities, but they rarely mishyphenate a word.

   • 1990 January 1, “Product Comparison”, in InfoWorld, volume 12, number 1, page 51:

     It did not mishyphenate any words, but it missed more hyphenation opportunities than any other program (20).

   • 1995, Sipapu - Volumes 25-26, page 14:

     The initial story, “ In the presence of greatness: the Bukowski Barfly narrative," describes an encounter with “Hank” at the opening of Bukowski's movie, Barfly (we have this lamentable tendency to mishyphenate the word as “Barf - ly") .