Height

[Kyung]

Everybody seems to do this differently.

If they just say five eight. No inches, no feet, no nothing. What do you put?

Five-eight
five, eight
5, 8

Let's get some consensus.

[Rosalie DeLeonardis]

I've always wrote it as five eight, no hypen, no comma. Now I'm curious if I've been doing it wrong. I guess I'll pull out the rule book.

[Marla Sharp]

I do five-eight, but I like the way 5'8" looks because that's normally how you'd see it. But if it's a video, you can't put the little apostrophe or quotation mark because it wasn't said.

I checked my old punctuation book, "Court Reporting: Grammar and Punctuation," from court reporting school to see how they suggested handling it. It doesn't necessarily address when they say the numbers for feet and inches but not "feet" and "inches, but here's what it did say:
"Use figures to express measurements of length, volume, weight, temperature, etc. 45 miles, 110 volts, 4 pounds 9 ounces. Note: It is sometimes acceptable to write out measurements when employing numbers under ten. Meggan is about five feet tall."

So I guess you could take from that that five-eight is less than ten and should be written out.

[Marla Sharp]

I found this in the Q&A section on The Chicago Manual of Style's site:

Hyphens, En Dashes, Em Dashes
Q. Can you offer any guidance as to how best to render people’s height? I’ve seen “five feet, two inches” (tall), “five-feet-two-inches” “five-feet-two,” “five-foot-two” (yikes!), “five-two,” all of the preceding with the hyphens placed otherwise or omitted, and, of course, good old 5' 2''. I’ve searched “Chicago” but haven’t found the answer. Help!

A. I would recommend that you write, for example, the following:
five feet six inches tall
5 feet 5¼ inches tall ( or five feet five and one-quarter inches tall)
five feet six
five-six
Sometimes “foot” and “feet,” as you’ve pointed out, are exchanged, probably because there can be a gray area between noun and adjective functions. So, “five feet two [inches tall]” can be interchanged with “five foot two [gymnast].” In my opinion the latter is awkward no matter what, and it sounds colloquial.

[kathy - iamwrdsmth]

i would put it in my transcript as 5-8

here's another number question:

when they are referring to numbers (there are a LOT of numbers
in family law), they sometimes abrievate it.
so 35,500 will become thirty-five five how would you write that??
i write it: 35-5
kathy

[Brenda Rogers]

I put in 35,5 keeping the same format but leaving off the zeros. Others use words.

[kathy - iamwrdsmth]

Brenda,
I started doing that, (using the 35,5)
but then it just looks like
I've left out something (like the extra zeros).
And with all the dashes I have to use from all
the people talking over each other, I don't need another
point on which my transcript is questioned.

[Brenda Rogers]

I don't know if there's a really good, clear way of doing it. Choose one and dive in!

[LeAnne Law]

I write it out. I think it's easier to read. Thirty-five five. On numbers, I adhere by if in doubt, write it out.

[Amy]

I would just write it as "five, eight," but I've seen it done differently too. Now I have to rethink it cause I see everybody else is doing it five-eight.

[kathy - iamwrdsmth]

so funny that we had this discussion in the last week, because
I've just done a transcript where I've had to address this very
issue!!
it seemed right just to put five-six in my transcript!!
thanks for all the points of view!
kathy