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85
Commas are required: (a) between items in a series; (b) between coordinate adjectives; (c) before
coordinating conjucnctions joining independent clauses; (d) around parenthetical elements; and (e) after fairly
long phrases or clauses preceding the main clauses of sentences.
(a) The experience demanded blood, sweat, and tears.
(b) We listened to an absorbing, frightening account of the event.
(c) Congress passed the bill by a wide margin, and the president signed it into law.
(d) The invention, the first in a series during that decade, completely changed people's lives.
(e) After carefully studying all the available historical documents and personal writings, scholars could come
to no definitive conclusion.
Commas are also used in dates (June 23, 1983), names (Cal Ripken, Jr.) and addresses (Rosemary Brady of
160 Can-oil Street, Brooklyn, New York).
3. Dashes (-)
The dash may be used: (a) around parenthetical elements that represent a break in the flow of thought; (b)
around parenthetical elements that require a number of internal commas; and (c) before a summarizing
appositive.
(a) The rapid spread of the disease — the number of reported cases doubled each six months — helped
create the sense of panic.
(b) Many twentieth-century American writers — Faulkner, Capote, Styron, Welty, to name only a few—
come from the South.
(c) Computer chips, integrated circuits, bits, and bytes — these new terms baffled yet intrigued.
4. Exclamation marks (!)
Exclamation marks follow the words of an exclamation (i.e., an expression of sudden strong feeling).
«I'm hungry!» she exclaimed.
5. Hyphens (-)
Hyphens are used to connect numbers indicating a range (1-20) and also to form some types of compound
words, particularly compound words that precede the words they modify (a well-established policy, a first-rate
study). Hyphens also join prefixes to capitalized words (post-Renaissance) and link pairs of coequal nouns
(poet-priest, scholar-athlete).
6. Italics (and/or underlining)
Some titles are italicized (underlined in typing), as are letters, words, or phrases cited as linguistic examples,
words referred to as words,* and foreign words in an English text. Italics are sometimes used for emphasis (I
never said that).
* The word Heartfelt is composed by joining heart and felt.
7. Parentheses ()
Parentheses enclose parenthetical remarks that break too sharply with the surrounding text to be enclosed in
commas. Parentheses sometimes dictate a greater separation than dashes would, but often either set of marks is
acceptable, the choice depending on the other punctuation required in the context.
8. Periods (.)
Periods end declarative sentences.
9. Quotation marks (« »)
Quotation marks should enclose quoted material, certain titles and words or phrases purposely misused or
used in an ironic or other special sense (e.g., Their «benefactor» was ultimately responsible for their downfall).
10. Semicolons (;)
Semicolons are used: (a) between items in a series when some of the items require internal commas; (b)