The Punctuation Guide
thepunctuationguide.com
The Punctuation Guide
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Re: The Punctuation Guide
#2Actually pretty good but it still falls into the trap of thinking that there are rules, and that some people follow them and some people break them. For example:
> When used in this way, the bracketed information should be an addition, not a substitution. For example, if the original quotation is “She never called back,” do not change it to “[Lucy] never called back.” Instead write: “She [Lucy] never called back.” (Note: Many newspapers ignore this rule. In professional and academic writing, it is better to follow it.)
Says who?
About the only real "rule" I can think of in English is that you use "an" iff the following word starts with a vowel sound. But even some people (idiots) break that rule for the weirdly specific case of 'historic'.
Re: The Punctuation Guide
#3I enjoyed the rules about the em dash — It reminded me of the English class that I was taught that you could use it in place of pretty much every bit of punctuation and the subsequent essays I wrote having optimized the rules of English punctuation somewhat ;-)
Re: The Punctuation Guide
#4Actually pretty good but it still falls into the trap of thinking that there are rules, and that some people follow them and some people break them. For example: > When used in this way, the bracketed information should be an addition, not a substitution. For example, if the original quotation is “She never called back,” do not change it to “[Lucy] never called back.” Instead write: “She [Lucy] never called back.” (N…
I agree: there are no rules in a language.
The baseline is to try to produce something that can be understood by your public, so try to stick to whatever convention they are used to, or come up with new ways that they can make a sense of.
But I won't even call that a "rule".
Re: The Punctuation Guide
#5This is quite specific to US English, for example "Top Ten Tips" number 2 about quotation marks. As Robert Bringhurst says in The Elements of Typographic Style:
Most North American editors like their commas and periods inside the raised commas, "like this;" but their colons and semicolons outside. Many British editors prefer to put all punctuation outside, with the milk and the cat.
Re: The Punctuation Guide
#6Actually pretty good but it still falls into the trap of thinking that there are rules, and that some people follow them and some people break them. For example: > When used in this way, the bracketed information should be an addition, not a substitution. For example, if the original quotation is “She never called back,” do not change it to “[Lucy] never called back.” Instead write: “She [Lucy] never called back.” (N…
I agree: there are no rules in a language. The baseline is to try to produce something that can be understood by your public, so try to stick to whatever convention they are used to, or come up with new ways that they can make a sense of. But I won't even call that a "rule".
> I agree: there are no rules in a language.
Really? Isn't that a bit broad? It may be half true for some languages but definitely not for all.
For example in Germany we have the "Der Duden" which is not only a dictionary that defines the correct spelling of words but also contains a huge set of grammatical rules. It's still the de-facto standard for correct language in German.
And even in english you'd probably agree that there are some rules, e.g. when it comes to the correct spelling of words.
Re: The Punctuation Guide
#7If you're looking for a free resource, I found the Style Manual by the U.S. Government Printing Office a helpful reference on how to write and typeset things in English.
https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/GPO-STYLEMANUAL-2008/content-d...
Re: The Punctuation Guide
#8Actually pretty good but it still falls into the trap of thinking that there are rules, and that some people follow them and some people break them. For example: > When used in this way, the bracketed information should be an addition, not a substitution. For example, if the original quotation is “She never called back,” do not change it to “[Lucy] never called back.” Instead write: “She [Lucy] never called back.” (N…
Sociologically it's perhaps interesting. One might want to "follow the rules" in order to minimize friction with an intended audience. Also, I'm sure we've all encountered cases where punctuation changes how we interpret a sentence. Then there's the more artistic concern of stylistic consistency. These punctuation "rules" might be better seen as some sort of a protocol standard. I'm pretty sure there are, in fact, several competing standards. Following whatever standard is clearly a choice, but that choice does something for setting up reader expectations.
Re: The Punctuation Guide
#9Actually pretty good but it still falls into the trap of thinking that there are rules, and that some people follow them and some people break them. For example: > When used in this way, the bracketed information should be an addition, not a substitution. For example, if the original quotation is “She never called back,” do not change it to “[Lucy] never called back.” Instead write: “She [Lucy] never called back.” (N…
There may not be rules, but as in language as a whole, there are commonly shared and accepted conventions that can aid comprehensibility -- but only to the extent that they are commonly shared and accepted.
I've known some people who insist that punctuation is irrelevant, and they can understand written text perfectly well without it. And their reading speed does seem to be unaffected by the presence or absence of punctuation. But I generally find that while my reading speed is about the same as theirs for unpunctuated text, I read punctuated text faster than they do. Conventional punctuation helps those acquainted with the conventions to parse text.
As they are just conventions, they will inevitably change over time. For example, it seems to be increasingly common to link two main clauses with a comma. Outside certain rhetorical and poetical usages, I find this jarring. But I may already be in a minority, and at some point in the not too distant future, it may not merit comment at all, except in the rantings of rules-fixated, traditionalist grammarians and would-be grammarians.
Re: The Punctuation Guide
#10Actually pretty good but it still falls into the trap of thinking that there are rules, and that some people follow them and some people break them. For example: > When used in this way, the bracketed information should be an addition, not a substitution. For example, if the original quotation is “She never called back,” do not change it to “[Lucy] never called back.” Instead write: “She [Lucy] never called back.” (N…
I agree: there are no rules in a language. The baseline is to try to produce something that can be understood by your public, so try to stick to whatever convention they are used to, or come up with new ways that they can make a sense of. But I won't even call that a "rule".
The goal of communication is to accurately exchange information. Doing so accurately requires both parties adhering to rules they have previously agreed on. If you don't want to accurately exchange information, that is a choice you can make. However, it should come as no surprise when you find people ignoring your attempt to contribute.
I don't think it needs to be exact, but an effort to express things accurately should be made. If I say, "Fish garbanzo bean flunky jellybean!" It is quite reasonable for you to say, "No, that isn't the name of an ocean."
If I continue doing so, then I would expect to be excluded from the conversation.