Em

Part of speech: noun, adjective

Definitions

1. A unit of measure in typesetting equal to the width of the letter M in a given font ; the thirteenth letter of the English alphabet, written as a capital M
2. A typographic measurement based on the width of a capital M in the typeface being used ; the name given to the letter M in the alphabet
3. The printer's unit of width matching the capital M of a font ; the letter M, the thirteenth character of the English alphabet

Etymology: The em is a unit of width in typesetting, and its name comes from the letter it was measured by. In letterpress printing, the "m quadrat" was a block of metal type cast as wide as the point size of the font, so the m-shaped block became the measuring unit. Its variant, the em quad, gave the dash its name: an em dash is as wide as that square. The term was in use by 1808. The word also has a second life as a pronoun. In the 1970s, Christine M. Elverson coined "em" by dropping the "th" from "them," creating a gender-neutral singular pronoun. It may have been influenced by the older "'em," a clipped form of "them," although the two were originally unrelated.

Synonyms: them