[General] writing as a side-line

[Silverobama]

Hi.

Let's say Silver is a doctor, but he also writes things in his spare time to earn money, maybe it's a part-time job. Is it natural to say "Silver is a doctor, but he does a bit of writing as a side-line"?

 

[GoesStation]

Yes, but you should remove the hyphen. Just write sideline.

 

[Silverobama]

Yes, but you should remove the hyphen. Just write sideline.

Just curious. Is it the same in BrE? I think in BrE it should be "side-line".

 

[Rover_KE]

Is it the same in BrE?

Yes.

 

[GoesStation]

Just curious. Is it the same in BrE? I think in BrE it should be "side-line".

Compound nouns tend to follow a rapid evolution through three stages. They may begin separated by a space, then be joined by a hyphen, and finally get welded into a single word. Some compounds keep the hyphen if they'd be very difficult to read without it. For example, the slangy phrase give someone the side-eye has become popular recently. Side-eye will probably keep its hyphen if it's adopted into standard English because "sideeye" has such an ungainly string of vowels.

 

[GoesStation]

I've just run across an example of such a noun in a state of flux. The current riots have introduced a new name for flash grenades into American journalism. I'm reading a (paywalled/pay-walled) Washington Post article that calls them flash bangs. This already looks dated; flash-bangs and flashbangs are both widespread (not "wide-spread").

As you may notice above, the same dynamic applies to compound adjectives.

 

[jutfrank]

We also use on the side.

... he does a bit of writing on the side.