Exploring Punctuation for Making Meaningful Sentences ! Learn Skills How, Where, When and Why - A Simple Punctuatuation Adds Academic Value !!

Abstract:

Most guides to punctuation usage are organised under the different punctuation marks. Thus, you can look under 'commas' and find ten different uses of the comma listed, and so on. This is fine if you want to make a full list of all the different things punctuation can do in English. However, it is not so convenient if you have an idea of what you want to do, but don't know which punctuation mark - if any - should be used.

This guide is organised according to the functions of punctuation, the different things that punctuation can be used for. Hopefully, it will be useful for looking up the solution to specific problems. It is not intended as a systematic and complete account of English punctuation, but concentrates on areas of punctuation use that often cause difficulty.

Both British and American systems of punctuation are described in cases where these differ.

Keywords

Punctuation, Punctuation Marks, System of Punctuation, English Language, Academic Value 

Learning Outcomes 

After undergoing this article you will be able to understand the following:

1. What's Punctuation

2. Why punctuation is used in content?

3. What's the different types of punctuations?

4. Punctuations and their meaning 

5. Basic rules and guidelines for punctuation.

6. Common mistakes to avoid using the punctuation

7. Advantages of punctuation

8. Disadvantages of punctuation

9. Strategy to make effective use of punctuation

10. Conclusions

11. Conclusions

12.Faqs

References 

1. What's Punctuation

Punctuation, the use of spacing, conventional signs, and certain typographical devices as aids to the understanding and correct reading, both silently and aloud, of handwritten and printed texts. The word is derived from the Latin punctus, “point.” From the 15th century to the early 18th the subject was known in English as pointing; and the term punctuation, first recorded in the middle of the 16th century, was reserved for the insertion of vowel points (marks placed near consonants to indicate preceding or following vowels) in Hebrew texts. The two words exchanged meanings between 1650 and 1750.

2. Why punctuation is used in content?

important thing is to be consistent in your own writing as far as these options go. If you are writing for publication, the publisher will probably give you some guidelines to follow, and will 'tidy up' anything which is inconsistent with the 'house style'.

The modern trend is towards less use of punctuation marks where possible. However, the phrase 'where possible' is important! Sometimes the rules of punctuation usage state that you must use, for example, a comma in a particular place, and you cannot leave it out on the grounds that 'less punctuation is better'. Sometimes, too, the use of a comma may be optional from a technical point of view, but it can still make it easier for a reader to understand what you want to say.

3. What's the different types of punctuations?

The standard English punctuation is as follows: 

Types of punctuation and symbols

There are many different types of punctuation marks and typographical symbols. We’ll briefly touch on them now, but you can learn more about these characters by checking out the links in this list and also each section below:

1. Period
2. Question mark
3. Exclamation point
4. Comma
5. Colon
6. Semicolon
7. Hyphen
8. En dash
9. Em dash
10. Parentheses
11. Square brackets
12. Curly brackets
13. Angle brackets
14. Quotation marks
15. Apostrophe
16. Slash
17. Ellipses
18. Asterisk
19. Ampersand
20. Bullet point
21. Pound symbol
22. Tilde
23. Backslash
24. At symbol
25. Caret symbol
26. Pipe symbol

4. Punctuations and their meaning 

Period, question mark, and exclamation point

These three commonly used punctuation marks are used for the same reason: to end an independent thought.

Period (.)

A period is used to end a declarative sentence. A period indicates that a sentence is finished.

• Today is Sunday.

Unique to them, periods are also often used in abbreviations.

• Prof. Archana once again awarded a ludicrous amount of points to Gryffindor.

Question mark (?)

The question mark is used to end a question, also known as an interrogative sentence.

• Do you feel happy?

Exclamation point (!)

The exclamation point is used at the end of exclamations and interjections.

• Our house is decorated! 
• Wow!

Comma, colon, and semicolon

Commas, colons, and semicolons can all be used to connect sentences together.

Comma (,)

The comma is often the punctuation mark that gives writers the most problems. It has many different uses and often requires good knowledge of grammar to avoid making mistakes when using it. Some common uses of the comma include:

• Joining clauses: Ann loves Sun, and she loves him. 
• Nonrestrictive elements: My favorite team, the Fighting Royals, won the championship this year.
• Lists: The flag was lemony, white, and blue.
• Coordinate adjectives: The cute, happy cat licked my hand.

Colon (:)

• The colon is typically used to introduce additional information.

  • The detective had three suspects: the salesman, the gardener, and the lawyer.

  Like commas, colons can also connect clauses together.

  • We forgot to ask the most important question: who was asking for lunch?

  Colons have a few other uses, too.

  • The meeting starts at 9:15 a.m.
  • The priest started reading from Mark 4:7.

Semicolon (;)

• Like the comma and the colon, the semicolon is used to connect sentences together. The semicolon typically indicates that the second sentence is closely related to the one before it.

  • I can’t eat sea fish; I am highly allergic to them.
  • Lucy loves to eat all kinds of sweets; lollipops are her favorite.

Hyphen and dashes (en dash and em dash)

• All three of these punctuation marks are often referred to as “dashes.” However, they are all used for entirely different reasons.

Hyphen (-)

• The hyphen is used to form compound words.

  • I went to lunch with my father-in-law.
  • She was playing with a jack-in-the-box.
  • He was accused of having pro-British sympathies.

En dash (–)

• The en dash is used to express ranges or is sometimes used in more complex compound words.

  • The homework exercises are on pages 20–27.
  • The songwriter had worked on many Tony Award–winning productions.

Em dash (—)

• The em dash is used to indicate a pause or interrupted speech.

  • The thief was someone nobody expected—me!
  • “Those kids will—” was all he managed to say before he was hit by a water balloon.

  Parentheses, brackets, and braces
  

• These pairs of punctuation marks look similar, but they all have different uses. In general, the parentheses are much more commonly used than the others.

Parentheses ()

• Typically, parentheses are used to add additional information.

  • I thought (for a very long time) if I should actually give an honest answer.
  • Tomorrow is Christmas (my favorite holiday)!

  Parentheses have a variety of other uses, too.

  • Pollution increased significantly. (See Chart 14B)
  • He was at an Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) meeting.
  • Richard I of England (1157–1199) had the heart of a lion.

Square brackets []

• Typically, square brackets are used to clarify or add information to quotations.

  • According to an eyewitness, the chimpanzees “climbed on the roof and juggled [bananas].”
  • The judge said that “the defense attorney [Mr. Wright] had made it clear that the case was far from closed.”

Curly brackets {}

• Curly brackets, also known as braces, are rarely used punctuation marks that are used to group a set.

  • I was impressed by the many different colors {red, green, yellow, blue, purple, black, white} they selected for the flag’s design.

Angle brackets <>

• Angle brackets have no usage in formal writing and are rarely ever used even in informal writing. These characters have more uses in other fields, such as math or computing.

Quotation marks and apostrophe

• You’ll find these punctuation marks hanging out at the top of a line of text.

Quotation marks (“”)

• The most common use of quotation marks is to contain quotations.

  • She said, “Don’t let the dog out of the house.”
  • Bob Ross liked to put “happy little trees” in many of his paintings.

Apostrophe (‘)

• The apostrophe is most often used to form possessives and contractions.

  • The house’s back door is open.
  • My sister’s marriage is next week.
  • It isn’t ready yet.
  • We should’ve stayed outside.

Slash and ellipses

• These are two punctuation marks you may not see too often, but they are still useful.

Slash (/)

• The slash has several different uses. Here are some examples:

  • Relationships: The existence of boxer briefs somehow hasn’t ended the boxers/briefs debate.
  • Alternatives: They accept cash and/or credit.
  • Fractions: After an hour, 2/3 of the audience had already left.

Ellipses (…)

• In formal writing, ellipses are used to indicate that words were removed from a quote.

  • The Student convener said, “The damages will be … paid for by the city … as soon as possible.”

  In informal writing, ellipses are often used to indicate pauses or speech that trails off.

  • He nervously stammered and said, “Look, I … You see … I wasn’t … Forget it, okay.”

Typographical symbols

• Typographical symbols rarely appear in formal writing. You are much more likely to see them used for a variety of reasons in informal writing.

Asterisk (*)

• In formal writing, especially academic and scientific writing, the asterisk is used to indicate a footnote.

  • Chocolate is the preferred flavor of ice cream.*
    *According to survey data from the Ice Cream Data Center.

  The asterisk may also be used to direct a reader toward a clarification or may be used to censor inappropriate words or phrases.

Ampersand (&)

• The ampersand substitutes for the word and. Besides its use in the official names of things, the ampersand is typically avoided in formal writing.

  •  The band gave a speech at the Vivekananda Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.

Bullet Point (•)

• Bullet points are used to create lists. For example,

  For this recipe you will need:

  • eggs
  • milk
  • sugar
  • flour
  • baking powder

Pound symbol (#)

• Informally, the pound symbol is typically used to mean number or is used in social media hashtags.

  • The catchy pop song reached #1 on the charts.
  • Ready 4 Halloween 2morrow!!! #spooky #TrickorTreat

Tilde (~)

• Besides being used as an accent mark in Spanish and Portuguese words, the tilde is rarely used. Informally, a person may use it to mean “about” or “approximately.”

  • We visited Mohun Bagan during our vacation.
  • I think my dog weighs ~20 pounds.

Backslash (\)

• The backslash is primarily used in computer programming and coding. It might be used online and in texting to draw emoticons, but it has no other common uses in writing. Be careful not to mix it up with the similar forward slash (/), which is a punctuation mark.

At symbol (@)

• The at symbol substitutes for the word at in informal writing. In formal writing, it is used when writing email addresses.

  • His email address is anakonda@goo.xy.

Caret symbol (^)

• The caret symbol is used in proofreading, but may be used to indicate an exponent if a writer is unable to use superscript.

  • Do you know what 3^4 (3 to the power of 4) is equal to?

Pipe symbol (|)

• The pipe symbol is not used in writing. Instead, it has a variety of functions in the fields of math, physics, or computing.

5. Basic rules and guidelines for punctuation.

Punctuation marks can tell the reader when to slow down, speed up and stop. By breaking up your sentences, they contain and structure your ideas.

This guide includes advice on using some of the most common types of punctuation.

The Full Stop/Period

A Sentence is the Expression of a Complete Thought! When we complete a thought while speaking, we pause and when we write the same thought, we end it with a full stop/period. A Sentence can be as long as the thought is. But, the placement of the full stop means completion of the sentence, per se, the thought.

There are three major principal uses of the full stop:

• To indicate the end of a sentence
• To indicate that a word has been printed in its abbreviated form
• To show (when used in a series like this … that a word or section of words has been omitted from a piece of writing

E.g. We went for a walk in the morning.

Colon (:)

Colons follow independent clauses and are used to put emphasis on the information that follows it. They may come before a word, phrase, quotation, a list, examples, enumeration or a sentence.

E.g. John had only one thing on his mind: his career.

Semicolon (;)

Semicolon is used between two main clauses where the second main clause is not grammatically linked to the first.

E.g. Mark and his son start work at every morning; they get up early because there is always a lot to do.

Comma (,)

Commas are used to present shorter pauses than a semicolon. It is usually put after sub clauses. Comma is also used between two main clauses before the word ‘but’ and ‘or’, provided the second clause has a subject. Examples:

• Sheena was an intelligent, young lady.
• Tony looked for the book, but couldn’t find it.

Ellipses (…)

The Ellipses consists of three evenly spaced dots. It is used when you quote something and want to omit some other words. Ellipses should be used only when you are omitting words within citations.

E.g. The ceremony honoured some … from the US.

Apostrophe (’)

Apostrophes are used in the possessive form of nouns or short forms and contractions. In case of possessive form, they are placed before/after ‘s’ to show possession by a person/persons. Examples:

• We’ve (contraction of ‘we have’)
• Won’t (contraction of ‘will not’)
• I’ll (contraction of ‘I will’)
• Aren’t (contraction of ‘are not’)
• The girl’s dress. (Singular)
• The girls’ dresses. (Plural)
• Mr. Singh’s house. (Singular)
• The Singhs’ house. (Plural for family)

Question mark (?)

Question mark is used, instead of full stop, after a direct question. It cannot be used after an indirect question. Examples:

• Have you done your homework? (Direct form)
• She asked me whether I had completed my homework. (Indirect form)

Exclamation mark (!)

Exclamation marks are used after Interjections and after phrases and sentences expressing sudden emotion/wish.

E.g. What a terrible fire this is!

Quotation marks (“..”)

Quotation marks are put before and after direct speech. Also, a comma is put before or after the direct speech.

Examples:

• “It’s time for the movie,” Sheetal said.
• Sheetal said, “It’s time for the movie”.

6. Common mistakes to avoid using the punctuation

Comma splice

Missing commas

Run-on sentences

Sentence fragments

Incorrect quotation marks

Semicolon or colon

Hyphens

Dangling modifiers

Excess exclamation

Putting two spaces after a period

Using semicolons like commas

Capitalization

After introductory clauses

Multiple punctuation marks

Unnecessary comma

Its versus its

Apostrophe for plurals

Introductory commas

Extraneous apostrophes

Incorrect verb tense

Punctuation placement in dialogue

Pronoun agreement

Serial comma

Set off parenthetical material within

7. Advantages of punctuation

Using punctuation in sentences has several benefits:

1. Clarity: Punctuation helps to convey the intended meaning of a sentence by indicating pauses, breaks, and the relationships between different parts of the sentence. It allows readers to understand the structure and flow of the text.

2. Understanding: Punctuation helps to avoid misinterpretation and ambiguity. It enables us to differentiate between different types of statements, questions, commands, or exclamations, which can drastically alter the meaning of a sentence.

3. Emphasis: Punctuation allows us to emphasize certain words or phrases, adding emphasis or conveying a particular tone or mood. It helps to express emotions, such as excitement, surprise, or sadness, which enriches the overall meaning of the sentence.

4. Reading and comprehension: Proper use of punctuation makes reading and understanding easier. It helps readers to process information more effectively, allowing for smoother reading and comprehension.

8. Disadvantages of punctuation

What are the benefits of using punctuation in our sentences? What would happen if there was no punctuation in the English language?

Using punctuation in sentences has several benefits:

1. Clarity: Punctuation helps to convey the intended meaning of a sentence by indicating pauses, breaks, and the relationships between different parts of the sentence. It allows readers to understand the structure and flow of the text.

2. Understanding: Punctuation helps to avoid misinterpretation and ambiguity. It enables us to differentiate between different types of statements, questions, commands, or exclamations, which can drastically alter the meaning of a sentence.

3. Emphasis: Punctuation allows us to emphasize certain words or phrases, adding emphasis or conveying a particular tone or mood. It helps to express emotions, such as excitement, surprise, or sadness, which enriches the overall meaning of the sentence.

4. Reading and comprehension: Proper use of punctuation makes reading and understanding easier. It helps readers to process information more effectively, allowing for smoother reading and comprehension.

If there was no punctuation in the English language, several consequences might arise:

1. Ambiguity: Without punctuation, sentences could become confusing and open to multiple interpretations. The absence of clear pauses and breaks in text would make it difficult to distinguish between different parts of a sentence, leading to misunderstandings.

2. Difficulty in understanding: Texts without punctuation would be harder to comprehend, requiring extra effort and time to decipher the intended meaning. Reading would become more challenging and time-consuming.

3. Loss of tone and emphasis: Punctuation aids in conveying the intended tone, mood, and emphasis in a sentence. Without it, the ability to express emotions, sarcasm, or irony would be significantly diminished, reducing the richness and depth of written communication.

4. Lack of structure: Punctuation provides structure and organization to written language. Sentences would become long and convoluted, lacking clarity and coherence. The absence of punctuation would make it harder to identify the beginning and end of a sentence or to separate different ideas.

9. Strategy to make effective use of punctuation

• Helping students to achieve study success with guides, video tutorials, seminars and appointments.
• Improve your understanding of grammar and punctuation
• an excellent site with clear explanations and plenty of online exercises to test your understanding (University of Bristol).
• Academic Phrasebank
• Use this site for examples of linking phrases and ways to refer to sources.
• Learn English (British Council)
• High quality resources to help improve your English
• English for Uni (University of Adelaide)
• Engaging learning resources which aim to make difficult grammar and academic writing concepts easier to understand
• Grammar Resource
• Course on aspects of English grammar which are often a problem for students (University of Hull)
• English for Academic Purposes: Grammar
• Detailed explanation of how English grammar works with lots of exercises to put your knowledge into practice.

10. Conclusions

11.Faqs

Q. How do you punctuate a sentence ?

Ans.

All sentences need punctuation at the end. You can use a period to express a neutral tone, a question mark to show that the sentence is an inquiry, or an exclamation point to indicate excitement or a command. You can also end a sentence with a semicolon if a different, closely related sentence follows that sentence. Here’s an example that shows how each of these punctuation marks work:

Do I like cheese? No, I don’t like cheese. I love it! There are so many kinds of cheese; I never get bored.

References :

Punctuation for Review and Reference by Edward A. Voeller

A Manual for Writers of Research Papers, Theses, and Dissertations, Eighth Edition: Chicago Style for Students and Researchers by Kate L Turabian