2 replies to this topic

[AndyM]

Is anyone aware of a convention for the spacing of an apostrophe in a widely letterspaced word? Or anyone have an opinion of the matter?

The attached is a quick-and-dirty example of what I'm talking about. The last three examples show the apostrophe treated like a letter, the D' pair treated as a single letter but part of the word, and the D' pair treated rather more ambiguously -- part of ALASKA or not?

 letterspacing.jpg   21.25K   33 downloads

[natcase]

Is anyone aware of a convention for the spacing of an apostrophe in a widely letterspaced word? Or anyone have an opinion of the matter?

Good question. I'd think it depends on how the mark functions in the given word and language. Golfe d'Alaska is essentially a contraction, so I'd be inclined to make the spacing consistent between the "D" and the"A", and insert the apostrophe a little closer to the "D", becuase the contraction removes a letter from the "de" and not "Alaska". In cases where the apostrophe is (for example) notating a glottal stop or other independent sound, I'd treat it evenly between two letters. If it's being used as a quote mark, letter space it.

My 2¢

[AndyM]

Thanks Nat, that would be my second-last example. I am still torn between respecting the form of this language and giving the "specific" term, (Alaska -- as opposed to the generic/preposition part) its due legibility. Tomorrow I'll be able to ask some Francophone cartographers.