Do you capitalize both parts of a hyphenated word in a title?
"My Ex-Wife Hates Me"
or
"My Ex-wife Hates Me"
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3Just to echo VonC's answer: given the choice, a title like Co-Founder feels more appropriate with a capital initial in the second word. – benbland Mar 06 '14 at 11:41
1 Answers
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Capitalization of hyphenated words in general is really more a question of style than anything else.
In other word, choose a rule and be consistent with it:
From Garbl's writing center:
When capitalizing hyphenated words in a title, choose a style and follow it consistently.
Simplest is to capitalize only the first word unless later words are proper nouns or adjectives:
Unique benefits for part-time violinists,
All-American flag-waving techniques.Second is to capitalize all words except articles, short prepositions and short conjunctions:
Over-the-Counter Acid Reducers for Sale Here,
A Matter-of-Fact Approach to Guitar Tuning,
A New Park-and-Ride Lot for Commuters.Optional exceptions to the second style are to lowercase the word after a prefix unless it is a proper noun or adjective and to lowercase the second word in a spelled out number:
Anti-intellectual Conduct,
Twenty-first Century Values.
In your case, since "ex-" is a prefix:
My Ex-wife Hates Me
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1So if one writes "My Ex-Wife Hates Me", it is still correct, just that the optional exceptions mentioned in the answer is not observed? – tvk Nov 05 '17 at 20:33
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1How would you suggest 'add-on' be used here: "Introducing Health-Check - New Add-On to Product X"? – Fredrik Wendt Jul 14 '20 at 08:23
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Given the huge difference between how likely people are to capitalise the second component in *Ex-wife* compared to *Co-Founder, I think choose a rule and be consistent with it* is terrible advice. Whichever rule you choose and stick to, you'll be swimming against the linguistic tide with much of your text! – FumbleFingers Jun 27 '23 at 21:22