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Punctuation Rules

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flip2

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This irks me more than anything. I can overlook all the incorrect grammar structures of a sentence; hell, I do it myself.

There is one thing that gets me going: When people place commas and periods outside a quotation mark. All periods and commas, whether part of a title, actual quote, or whatever, always go inside the closed quotation mark.

"Word or phrase."

Not "word or phrase".

"It's this," not "that", or "especially this".

They do this on "Jeopardy!" You'd think, for a show in which knowledge is paramount, they would have known this. Also, the exclamation point "!" is part of the game show title; therefore, it is inside, rather than outside to stress an excited claim.

I'm a loser, I know this already.
 
I don't pay too much attention, so probably do it wrong. I forgot everything I learned in English class. Any rules on comma's? I either put in too many, or not enough. :doh
 
Thanks for your insight.

Now is there a reason why the first time you said "Word or phrase" the W is capitalized, but the second time it's lower-case?

Yeah I really like that show "Jepoardy"!
 
I hate when people use "then" in place of "than." Or, when they don't know the difference between "they're," "there," & "their." I have even seen on this forum someone use the word "are" in place of "our." I don't know about the folks on this forum but I have seen this on many other forums & many times these mistakes are from those who claim to be educated; at least in the sense that they attended a college or university.
 
Ooh, now this is a conversation I live for. I, as a student of English, have come to find that rules of grammar, while in many cases are helpful, mean absolutely next to nothing. Grammar, at least the way we consider it today, did not come about until the eighteenth century. Ever wonder why a lot of poetry and other such writings were done in verse? Because they did not have periods or commas. There is a very informative paper written on this subject. http://personal.ecu.edu/southardo/history.htm
I certainly tend to agree with the structualists in the issue. I think that as long as the idea is carried, the structure is irrelevant.
 
i'm just happy this thread actually got a response.

also, i agree that if the content is carried and understood, the structure doesn't matter.

but, if mistakes are so repetitive, it starts to get annoying. some basic grammar rules would be greatly appreciated.

except for capitalizing the first letter of a sentence. that's okay to do.
 
flip2 said:
i'm just happy this thread actually got a response.

also, i agree that if the content is carried and understood, the structure doesn't matter.

but, if mistakes are so repetitive, it starts to get annoying. some basic grammar rules would be greatly appreciated.

except for capitalizing the first letter of a sentence. that's okay to do.
Click to expand...

Hahahah, very nice.

I agree, the quote thing always bothers me. I also agree about the stylistic thing.

For example, using fragments of sentences to add a tone to your writing.

Like if you wanted to say, for example, Clinton was a bad president. Like, really bad. Horrible, in fact. Just awful.
 
Haha I am guilty of making grammer mistakes! LOL I do care when it comes to school and work but when I post on forums, when i talk on Instant message, I usually don't care/ pay attention to grammer mistakes. ;) But I understand how it can annoy you, sometimes the simple mistakes that people make annoy me. But nobody is perfect! Right! :lol: :smile:
 
Courtneyx3 said:
Haha I am guilty of making grammer mistakes! LOL I do care when it comes to school and work but when I post on forums, when i talk on Instant message, I usually don't care/ pay attention to grammer mistakes. ;) But I understand how it can annoy you, sometimes the simple mistakes that people make annoy me. But nobody is perfect! Right! :lol: :smile:
Click to expand...

holler.

ps everyones from tejas. wtf, mate?
 
flip2 said:
This irks me more than anything. I can overlook all the incorrect grammar structures of a sentence; hell, I do it myself.

There is one thing that gets me going: When people place commas and periods outside a quotation mark. All periods and commas, whether part of a title, actual quote, or whatever, always go inside the closed quotation mark.
Click to expand...

I'm hanging my head in shame :3oops:

I've done exactly what you described and thought I was correct. I looked it up and you're right, I'm wrong. Correct use of the English language, grammar and spelling are pet peeves of mine and here I am, making mistakes. Thanks for the update - I'll do much better in the future.
 
Arthur Fonzarelli said:
I hate when people use "then" in place of "than." Or, when they don't know the difference between "they're," "there," & "their." I have even seen on this forum someone use the word "are" in place of "our." I don't know about the folks on this forum but I have seen this on many other forums & many times these mistakes are from those who claim to be educated; at least in the sense that they attended a college or university.
Click to expand...


I have to agree whole-heartedly Arthur! Those are my two "Biggie" pet peeves as far as English usage.
There's a great book out I highly suggest for anyone who posts a lot.
(another lesser pet peeve, A LOT...it's TWO WORDS NOT ONE!)

"Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation" by Lynn Truss

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eats,_Shoots_and_Leaves

I highly recommend it!
 

Although proper English is sometimes a difficult endeavor, it's a piece of cake compared to Hebrew.

Like all Semitic languages, Hebrew is a language of roots and stems and is written from right-to-left. The Hebrew alphabet ( אלף-בית or alef-bet ) consists of 27 characters. For those fluent in Hebrew, no vowels are used in word construction. To facilitate efforts at translating Hebrew into languages such as English, a system has been devised where diacritic marks (dots and dashes called nikkudim or points) are written above or below the letter in ways that do not alter the spacing of the line. Text containing these markings is referred to as *pointed* text and the diacritic-nikkudim letters represent vowels.

There are two versions of some letters. Kaf, Mem, Nun, Peh and Tzadeh all are written differently when they appear at the end of a word than when they appear in the beginning or middle of the word. To further compound the language complexity, the first ten letters of the alef-bet also serve as the numerals from 1 to 10. Thus the first letter of the alef-bet א (alef) is also א (echad) or the numeral 1 and so on.

The consonants ב bet, ג gimel, ד dalet, כ kaf, פ pe, and ת tav each have two sounds... one hard (plosive consonant) and one soft (fricative consonant) depending on the position of the letter and other factors. There are currently four distinct styles of Hebrew writing in usage. The common style used in most Israeli books and publications is known as *block print*. There is also a stylized script much like the cursive style of English. For sacred texts such as the Torah, an exquisite style known as *STA"M* is used. In addition to STA"M, sacred texts deliniate inserted commentary with a style known as *Rashi Script*.

There is no universally accepted method of transliterating either the Hebrew or Arabic languages into English. That is why you will see various different English spellings for the same Semitic word. For example there are at least 15 different ways to spell *Mohammad* in English and none are either wholly correct or wholly incorrect. They are English approximations. Another example would be the name Osama bin Laden. Although this is the common and accepted English transliteration, it would also be quite correct to transliterate this as Usama bin Laden.

Because Semitic languages are built upon root and stem words, Hebrew and Arabic documents are subject to differing interpretations. That is why the Torah and Qur'an are subjected to continuous re-examinations by religious and language scholars.

All in all, consider yourselves fortunate indeed to have English as your mother tongue!

מאוייתת נכון (Tashah)


 
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