Phaedrus
Banned
- Joined
- Jul 19, 2012
- Member Type
- English Teacher
- Native Language
- English
- Home Country
- United States
- Current Location
- United States
A case could actually be made for using the en dash instead of the hyphen:
COVID-19–positive
Since "19" is joined to "COVID" by a hyphen, the en dash between "19" and "positive" clarifies that "positive" belongs to the preceding hyphenated duo.
For what it's worth, I have encountered this style of punctuation in something written by Noam Chomsky himself:
"This leaves e[SUB]j[/SUB], an element that we will refer to as PRO, an empty category with a restricted distribution to which we will return; in particular, it appears in non–Case-marked subject position, as in (93)" (p. 104, emphasis added).
- Chomsky, N. (1986). Knowledge of language: Its nature, origin, and use. Westport, CN: Praeger.
The phrase "non–Case-marked subject position" contains an en dash between "non" and "Case" and a hyphen between "Case" and "marked."
The punctuation clarifies that the reference is to something that is not marked with Case rather than to something that is marked with non-Case.