A CONCISE PUNCTUATION GUIDE
(Well, it depends on your definition of
concise.)
For the students of Laura Anschicks
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Note: I assume that students understand basic punctuation:
--end Marks such as period (.), exclamation point (!), and
question mark (?).
--apostrophes for possession and contractions (although students
frequently forget to put possessive apostrophes in)
Questions about these should be answered by the Little Brown
Handbook. If that is unclear, ask your instructor. If I cannot
help much, I will refer you to the Skills Center.
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INTERNAL PUNCTUATION:
the Comma, Semi-colon, colon, dash, & parenthesis
Think of punctuation as a tool to help keep your ideas from
tumbling into each other. Technically, the internal marks listed
above indicate structural breaks in the sentence.
You might recall that a sentence is supposed to express a
complete thought. Well, if we express every thought separately
in different sentences, we'll end up with something like the
following:
Grammar is dumb. Punctuation is dumber.
Why do I have to learn this anyway? Who made up these silly rules?
What am I going to write about? How am I ever going to get 5
paragraphs (or ten pages!) out of this topic? etc. etc.
Boring stuff. I do not find the content boring. What
turns my mind off is the repetitive, sing-song sentence structure.
I can think in more sophisticated ways than this, and so can
you. For instance:
While I'm frustrated by grammar
in general, the part that frustrates me most is punctuation.
I have gone over the rules umteen times in my life, and it hasn't
made much difference, so why do it again?
While the above are hardly a formal sentences for a formal
essay in a composition class, I use them to illustrate a point.
Short, single-thought sentences are choppy and dull. However,
sentences that combine thoughts in ways that show the relationships
are much easier to navigate and understand.
Now consider the revised sentences without punctuation:
While I'm frustrated by grammar in
general the part that frustrates me most is punctuation I have
gone over the rules umteen times in my life and it hasn't made
much difference so why do it again
Yes, I can read the sentences. However, I find that I must
work to find the pauses to make proper sense and read smoothly.
As a reader, I wouldn't want to read 10 or 12 pages of this kind
of thing, would you?
The comma:
The comma's job is lowly but vital: it marks structural breaks
in sentences so we can distinguish the parts easily.
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First, we must be able to identify the
core of the sentence, the main subject-verb combination
that is the central thought.
In the first sentence of my revised example, my point is
that rules of punctuation are the part of grammar I find most
frustrating. Therefore, I express that as the core part of the
sentence and place while I'm frustrated by grammar in general
as a subordinate element in front of it as a sort of lead-in.
To separate the two, I use a comma.
In the second sentence, there are three main points that are
equal in value:
a) I have gone over these umteen
times in my life, and
b) it hasn't made much difference, so
c) why do it again?
The conjunctions and and so express the connections.
The commas indicate where the complete thoughts end. Their presence
emphasizes that the parts are each complete, but are part of
a larger movement of thought that culminates in the emphasis
-- why do it again?
To summarize the comma rules students have most trouble
with:
Use commas -- after opening sentence
elements (1)
--around interrupting elements (2)
--before closing elements (3)
Example: When warm weather comes, (1) I love to swim,
(3)
unless, (2)
of course,(2)
it rains.
--in compound sentences to mark the
end of the first complete thought and before the conjunction
that connects the second complete thought.
Examples:
It is cold out, so I will wear a warm
coat.
I am going to do my homework, and there is nothing you can say
that will make me go out to a movie instead!
The semi-colon:
This mark is part period and part comma. Its most common
use is to clarify comma strength in sentences where the parts
are complicated and confusing:
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Example: The meal will consist of soup, crackers, and tomato
juice, salad with dressing, rolls, and butter, peas, carrots,
potatoes, and chicken, and apple pie, ice cream, and a cherry.
Phew! Don't even try to figure it out. Just check out the
revision below:
Revision: The meal will consist of soup,
crackers, and tomato juice; salad with dressing, rolls, and butter;
peas, carrots, potatoes, and chicken; and apple pie, ice cream,
and a cherry.
When students use the semi-colon to separate -- or to connect
-- sentences, there is often trouble. In most cases, why not
just use the period and let that stand? A
semi-colon does NOT express a connection; it implies one (see?). The semi-colon used
properly says, in effect that I have just made a complete statement
that works grammatically but not completely; therefore, the semi-colon
expresses that the completion is coming right up.
My favorite example of a perfect use of this punctuation
mark is the famous quote from John F. Kennedy: Ask
not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for
your country.
There! That is the best example I know of how a semi-colon
should be used because it is actually better than a period.
The colon:
Most students believe that a colon introduces a list.
Yes and no.
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A colon indicates that the complete statement is going to be
amplified: with a list, a quotation, or a short example such
as this list of proper uses I have just finished typing.
The key part of the above explanation is complete
statement. If there is no complete
sentence BEFORE the colon, then the colon is NOT correct.
Oh, you will see it misused even in print probably because the
writer (or publisher) feels a strong need of a dramatic pause.
There are better ways to make pauses:
Weak:
The students who will make As in this course are J_______, M_______,
P________, and maybe a few others.
This shows why people want to put
something after the are. As is, the sentence does not capture
the tension I--as writer-teacher -- believe exists in the readers.
Only a few students will earn an A
in this course:
J_______, M_______, and P________.
The second sentence has been re-structured to be a bit more dramatic.
(By the way, I'd be delighted if everyone earned an A.)
The dash:
Many teachers forbid the dash--and with good reason. When
I was a student, I used it when I wasn't sure what else to do.
However, now I find that a dash is the only thing to work in
some cases.
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The dash indicates a sudden shift in thought.
A sentence might be broken off in mid-thought, or take
a sudden change in direction--as when we correct ourselves in
speech. In formal writing, the idea is
to intend everything on the page without sudden, spontaneous
shifts. We are supposed to take time to get the writing
right. Hasty, last-minute jobs do not earn the best grades, or
respect.
However, there are times when a break in
thought adds a bit of spice. Perhaps an essay is supposed
to be rather informal and express "attitude" that we
do not normally expect in a "polished" piece. Personal
response papers might be classed this way. Certainly articles
in newspapers and magazines often aim for a conversational quality--as
does this particular discussion.
In fact, I just used a dash--did you catch it? OOPS--I've just
done it again--and again--oh, well, I hope you have the idea
by now.
The Parentheses:
Most of you know this one. It is the mark that
says you can skip that part because it is just some old added
comment that can be pulled out (of course, if the writer uses
it to add silly remarks like this one, it might be the best part
of the piece [don't over-do it, though (as I am doing here)]).
(By the way, parentheses within parentheses
usually use brackets: ([()]. It's like math, another favorite
subject of students.).
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