I often tell my international/ESL students that the difficulty about learning English is that so many of the rules don’t make sense logically, or there are a zillion exceptions to those rules. Also, most first language speakers don’t even know the rules, or how to use them correctly. However, if you make spelling or grammatical mistakes, you are instantly judged as someone who is incompetent/careless etc. and it undermines your credibility. This is especially relevant on the job hunt or when dealing with clients.
It also intrigues me how technology (including, and perhaps particularly, Smart Phones) has effected the English language and the level of carelessness involved with business communication. People type emails on their iPhones, riddled with mistakes, typos, spelling errors etc. I guess some people can be forgiven thinking that such things are acceptable, now that *shudder* LOL, OMG and FYI have been accepted by, and in, the Oxford English Dictionary.
As I seem to be on a grammar rant/kick at the moment (see my previous post on apostrophe use), I thought I’d add a post on correct comma usage. The danger, as with any punctuation, is that if you change a placement of a comma, or forget one somewhere, you can alter the meaning of your sentence.
The Five Rules for Comma Use
Rule 1. Use commas to separate three or more items in a series.
The easiest, most basic use of the comma is to separate a list of items, whether they are words, phrases, or
clauses. For example, the previous sentence shows the separation between three words in a list. Although I remember being told you can’t use a comma before ‘and’, you actually can (depending on the situation – see rule 2). It helps the reader understand your meaning, creates crisper sentences, and stops any confusion (see how easy to read the previous sentence is?).
Rule 2.Put a comma between independent clauses when they are joined by for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so.
If you have two complete sentences** (also called independent clauses) and you want to join them together to show a connection using what are rather fancily called co-ordinating conjunctions, then you must use a comma between them. An easy way to remember what these conjunctions are is the acronym/mnemonic device ‘FANBOYS’ – for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so.
For example: I like my job, but I prefer going on holiday. OR I missed the bus, so I have to run to class.
This is not to be confused with a sentence that has only one subject, but multiple verbs. In this case, if you see FANBOYS, you don’t need a comma.
For example: We loved the book but hated the movie. There is one subject “we” and two verbs “loved” and “hated”. This is just one clause, so you don’t need a comma.
Rule 3.Put a comma after an introductory word, phrase, or clause that comes BEFORE an independent clause.
If you are introducing an idea or adding introductory information to a sentence, you must put a comma after that introductory word, phrase, or clause. However, this is only necessary if the word/phrase/clause comes before an independent clause. As you can see, all the sentences in this paragraph follow this rule.
If the information comes after the independent clause, you don’t need to use a comma.
For example: You don’t need to use a comma if the information comes after the independent clause.
Rule 4.Use commas to separate any information (word, clause, phrase) that is NOT ESSENTIAL to the meaning/main idea of the sentence.
Compare these two sentences:
All applicants who used grammar correctly were hired immediately.
All applicants, who used grammar correctly, were hired immediately.
Do you know the difference in meaning between the two? If I separate a word, phrase, or clause from the rest of the sentence using commas, it tells the reader that information is not important to the sentence. Therefore, if you mentally delete the information separated by commas you get the correct meaning of the sentence.
So, sentence 1 means that only the applicants who used correct grammar were hired. The second sentence means that everyone who applied for the job was hired, whether or not they used correct grammar.
Rule 5.Use commas to separate coordinate adjectives, NOT cumulative adjectives.
Say WHAT? Yes, I doubt your average first language English speaker would even know that there are even different types of adjectives, but its true.
Coordinate adjectives are descriptive words whose order in the sentence can be changed around, or you could put ‘and’ between them, and this would not change the meaning of the sentence. You must put commas between these types of adjectives if you aren’t going to use ‘and’.
For example: The company was full of polite, intelligent employees. The company was full of intelligent, polite employees. The company was full of intelligent and polite employees.
The meaning of the sentence doesn’t change.
Cumulative adjectives are different. These rely on each other in a particular order to make sense, because each adjective builds on the next one i.e. they ‘accumulate’ meaning.
For example: The princess wore a pale blue chiffon dress.
You can’t say the princess work a chiffon and blue pale dress. The particular colour of blue is pale, the material the dress is made of (chiffon) is pale blue, and the dress as a whole is made of pale blue chiffon.
Make sense? Good.
These are not hard rules to learn, nor are they hard to apply. All it takes is a bit of time, care, and proofreading.
FYI
Geraldine
**A complete sentence/independent clause (same thing) has a subject, a verb, and it expresses a complete idea that makes sense i.e. someone/something doing/being something.
One of the challenges that we face living in a world of ever increasing information and “noise” is missing the mark when we try to communicate. You can craft a direct, focused, concise email and still get a reply that shows you the reader has not, in fact, actually read the whole email. You can use careful reader access techniques like lists and tables to highlight important information, and still you get a response that shows the person has not bothered to even glance at what you have provided.
There are so many different ways to illustrate information, but making careful choices around what kind of graphic you use ensures the audience will understand and retain your message.
