Punctuation, Part 1

Punctuation, Part 1

Utilization of punctuations is an integral part of the writing process.  Below is the analyzation of three areas of punctuation which I think I need to work on. 

Barrett, Tom. "Punctuation Pyramid" 2/6/08 via flickr. Creative Commons Attribution.

• Unnecessary Commas:
• There are many points in a sentence in which a writer should not use a comma but does anyways. One of these points is "using a comma to set off restrictive or mildly parenthetical elements". In the past I would often use this in order to insert necessary details into the paper. I found it interesting to learn that these modifiers would only be set off if they are not essential to the understanding of the sentence. Another point that surprised me was that a writer should not use a comma "between cumulative adjectives, between adjective and a noun, or between an adverb and an adjective".  In the past I would always use commas to separate the describing words even if I only had two of them. In reality, commas are not appropriate between adjectives that cannot be joined with the word and. 
• The semicolon:
• Another point of writing that always seemed to confuse me was the semicolon. A writer should utilize the semicolon "between closely related independent clauses not joined with a coordinating conjunction". I had learned that a semicolon should be used when there are two independent clauses in one sentence. I found it interesting that this semicolon could be used in between two independent clauses with a transitional expression too in order to make the connection more fluid. 
• Quotation Marks, 
• I always knew that quotation marks were used for direct quotations but upon reading more about them I realized they have a variety of other uses as well. Direct quotations are enclosed by quotation marks but indirect quotations and long quotations do not use the quotation marks. It was interesting to learn that where you put sentence punctuation in relation to quotation marks affects how the sentence is read. If a question mark goes inside a quotation it applies to the question of the quote were as a question mark outside of the quotation marks is taken in account to the whole sentence. It also was interesting to learn that sometimes people misuse quotation marks by putting them around common used slang or expressions which is not appropriate. 

Reflection: 

I read both Bailey's and Aaron's project two rough drafts. Both were pretty good at speaking towards their individual claims regarding their articles but each draft had things that can be improved throughout the revision process. There were a number of unnecessary comma uses and so it was nice to learn that my peers often have the same difficulties I have when determining whether or not to use a comma. The semicolon is used less frequently and so it was hard to determine much about it during the peer editing process. Quotation marks were used quite often and so it was interesting to see where my classmates find problems and difficulties with those. 

The excerpt below can be found in Aaron's rough draft. In this sentence in specific there is a misuse of commas, a topic which I read about for blog post 8.1. There should not be a comma after the word article due to the fact that it is not an independent clause or separating unnecessary details from the subject. Additionally, for this sentence the period at the end should be outside of the quotation marks in order to signify not only the end of the quote but also the end of the sentence as a whole. 

"In the article, New York Times reporter Jenna Wortham interviews Cole Stryker, author of "Epic Win for Anonymous: How 4chan's Army Conquered the Web.""

The following excerpt comes from Bailey's rough draft. It was interesting to see a longer quote used in someone's draft. Based off of the reading I did I believe that this longer quote should not have quotations around it. 

“Question: Do you like to chat with other people?

Koko: fine nipple

Patterson: Nipple rhymes with people, she doesn’t sign people per se, she was trying to do a ‘sounds like…’” (Hu 2).