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Nobody. Understands. Punctuation.

stilldrinking.org

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Re: Nobody. Understands. Punctuation.

#11

Post by maxerickson »

js2 wrote: post #8

In this case, em dashes are doing something similar to a pair of commas, which can also denote side info but they do it more casually, and parentheses. "and parentheses" what? And they are also like em dashes? Edit: Thank you for the explanation folks. For whatever reason I found the use of commas to denote the aside very difficult to parse. I think maybe it's because of the first comma after "In this case."

It's about a 3 way similarity between em dashes, comma pairs and parentheses.

(if they didn't share the similarity I guess 'or' would fit better)

Re: Nobody. Understands. Punctuation.

#12

Post by Istof »

steve_benjamins wrote: post #7

Loved his points about how you can hear punctuation in speech: "Morgan Freeman is liberal with the commas, and Jon Stewart is a master of parentheses. Lewis Black made a career out of the exclamation point while Dennis Leary barely uses any punctuation at all." Overall, a great Sunday morning read.

it's a good point, but isn't that the point of punctuation?

Re: Nobody. Understands. Punctuation.

#13

Post by lambda »

Ouch. Fairly nicely written piece about punctuation, and generally nicely formatted with justification, properly indented paragraphs, use of em dashes, and so on; and then it uses straight quotes everywhere. While I'm generally used to straight quotes everywhere on the web, the additional standard set by the rest of the typesetting and the topic meant that their omission here was that much more glaring.

Re: Nobody. Understands. Punctuation.

#14

Post by [deleted] »

bencoder wrote: post #10
js2 wrote: post #8

In this case, em dashes are doing something similar to a pair of commas, which can also denote side info but they do it more casually, and parentheses. "and parentheses" what? And they are also like em dashes? Edit: Thank you for the explanation folks. For whatever reason I found the use of commas to denote the aside very difficult to parse. I think maybe it's because of the first comma after "In this case."

try: > In this case, em dashes are doing something similar to a pair of commas (which can also denote side info but they do it more casually) and parentheses. The commas after "pair of commas" are the parenthetical commas he is describing

[deleted]

Re: Nobody. Understands. Punctuation.

#16

Post by notduncansmith »

dilap wrote: post #9

Only tangentially related, but it's the weekend, so what the hell, enjoy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_i1xk07o4g

Knew it before I even clicked the link. They've gone a bit downhill since their first album, but the first (on which this song appears) is a classic.

Re: Nobody. Understands. Punctuation.

#17

Post by marmarlade »

I was never taught about the Oxford Comma (I'm not a native speaker), but trained myself to use it consistently after seeing this http://jaced.com/blogpix/2013/washingtonlincolnoxford.jpg.

This has made me rethink though - he makes a great point that writing is about transferring the voices in my head into the readers', so I'll keep that in mind for any creative writing.

Heck, not just creative writing, I can think of more than one occasion where I put an Oxford Comma in a press release even though it read better to me without.

Thanks for sharing!

Re: Nobody. Understands. Punctuation.

#18

Post by lmkg »

saurik wrote: post #2

> An Oxford comma is not a flip switch in an author's voice, it's a decision made in the moment to maintain the flow of the idea. I am more than happy to truly believe this premise (and if you read some of the things I write, and how I use punctuation, I hope the reader will agree ;P), and can come up with situations where the extra comma "breaks the rythm" and cases where it "makes the sentence". > Momentum, syncopa…

Without the commas, it sounds to me like the author is excited and animated about his topic, tumbling forward. I imagine him gesticulating wildly. I guess you were imagining more of a measured pronouncement, with paused emphasis to cause us to carefully consider each element. As he says, the punctuation imparts different styles.

I think the tumbling-forward interpretation works better with the list having four elements. They're meant to be a cumulative item, making his point as much by the number of different elements as by the meaning of each individual one. This style works better when it gives the impression of rushing.

Re: Nobody. Understands. Punctuation.

#20

Post by chasing »

Grammar and punctuation are usability tools. The writer is allowed to use the whole set of characters, punctuation, and symbols to express himself or herself. There's no law against title my next piece of writing: "Gsfbvsrnbwrkng!#$#jkgfbfart." (And I believe this is, in fact, taught in high schools. It was to me, at least: Our literature textbooks seemed to always include works by e e cummings, for example.) But we have this set of recommendations for writing in the English language that maximizes clarity and comfort when reading. Many high school students don't care about writing. Either they find it boring or don't understand why it's useful or are intimidated by books or something else entirely. So sometimes rules just have to be pounded into them.

And anyone complaining about the quality of public education in the United States, before you get down on teachers, go take a look at what people get paid and what resources are provided to teachers. Especially in poorer parts of the country. We're getting what we pay for.

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