em

Meanings

1. 1
   pron

   an informal, usually unstressed form of them, commonly written ’em

   Put ’em on the table and I will sort them later.

2. 2
   noun

   a unit of typographic width equal to the current font size

   The designer set the paragraph indent to one em.

The pronoun descends from Middle English hem, an unstressed object form of they, and was later understood as a shortening of them. The typographic noun is the spoken name of the letter m, traditionally associated with a piece of type as wide as it was high.

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