Open Question about Punctuation
 

This is just an open question, I don't have any answers. Are you noticing that people, especially on-line, use line-breaks as punctuation?

Just a question because I think I caught myself donig it.

What are line breaks? Dashes?

no.

line breaks.

are seperations.

for seemingly no real point.

its mostly html decoration.

This

is a line break. :)


Punctuation and english is a bit hard. I'm not sure the grammar rules for norwegian and english are the same. I can't remember ever covering punctuation in english classes. Are all these correct uses of commas?


"When I farted, Henry died."

"I am a person, and I like grapes."

"The dog, which was brown, smelled awful."

"The guy whose buttocks I waxed, fell in love with me."

"Boardtracker, a musicbanter tracking bot, is less boring than Erica."

"My favourite forum, the lounge, is full of crappy threads."

"RT, come here!"
"You go, girl!"
"Well, my boy?"
"No smoking in my office, please!"

"Poor people smell, Big3 said."

"Britney Spears is sexy, talented, highly sophisticated, bow-chicka-bowowish and full of spunk, according to Jackhammer."

Looks correct to me, Tore.

Regarding line breaks, I prefer to use them to separate different thoughts or replies that don't belong in the same "paragraph", for lack of a better word. When reading, it's easier to distinguish between blocks of main ideas that way and gives a sense that there's a transitional breath being taken between them, as you would in actual speaking.
Using line breaks after every sentence, however, seems excessive to me unless it's like only two sentences with an intended sense of space and pause between them.

Ultimately, I view line breaks as... breaks. It helps multiple ideas have their own space and allows for a more structured flow of paragraphs. The problem is that a lot of people don't use it to that advantage, so it just becomes pointless spaces.

They're not for punctuation, it's for the text format, it's easier to read text that isn't clumped up together.

It would be

very Weird

if people actually used line breaks as punctuation

Don't you think?

I do that
all the time.

Oh, OK. I get it now. I don't think it's necessarily considered as punctuation. I feel like a lot of posters do it for delivery effect, and I feel some do it out of habit. I find it quite annoying myself, but won't ignore a post of it's in line break format. Now, for your commas, Tore! I love grammar. Not claiming that I'm some expert. I just love writing in general.

These, I believe, are correct. :)


"The guy, whose buttocks I waxed, fell in love with me." OR "The guy whose buttocks I waxed fell in love with me."
This is a tricky one for me. I didn't know if I should have taken out your comma or add another comma after 'the guy'. Can anyone help?

"Poor people smell," Big3 said.
Your comma was in the right spot, but your closing quotation mark was not. Also, the alternatives of quotation and comma usage:

Big3 said, "Poor people smell."

"Poor people," Big3 said, "smell like trash."

"Poor people smell," Big3 said. "Do we beat them for it?"

Ah, you guys get the point.

When in doubt, leave it out. Although I BELIEVE the former is the correct form; you need commas to set off the appositive from the rest of the sentence.

Also applies to lists of stuff where it precedes conjunctions -- the comma becomes superfluous.

Every bit of that is fine and correct Tore 10/10.
As I remember, it's not incorrect to omit the comma while using and.

"Poor people smell, Big3 said"

^ If it was actually said, wouldn't that be correct?

No10 is wrong Tore. Jackhammer doesn't like Britney Spears whatsoever!

I think it depend on the situation. If you are using "whose buttocks I waxed" as way identifying the guy, as in, "not the guy who came in for a mani/pedi", then commas aren't necessary. If you've previously established the identity, and "whose buttocks I waxed' is an aside to provide supplementary or gratuitous information, then the use of commas to form a parenthetical phrase is appropriate.

If someone said Big3 said it, yes.

But if someone is telling you that Big3 said it, then no.

I.e. is it first hand or second hand information?

That was my point.
Obviously, if it reads like this; "Poor people smell, Big3 said". It's correct to assume it's second hand information. Meaning the punctuation is good.

Edit: Do me a favour and click on my sig to join The Green & Gold Revolution. :D

o-k, did someone say it was wrong? Tell me what I'm missing here.

Didn't 333 assume it was wrong?

And what have you got against poor people Brennan?

1. I don't read what 333 says.

2. I hate my own.

Seems to me that if it's a quoted response, it should read like this:

Q: "What did Big3 say?"
A: He said; "Poor people smell." OR "Poor people smell."
The tricky one is: "Big3 said poor people smell." because it seems redundant in context with the Q... but I don't think it's correct, as a quoted response, to write "Poor people smell, Big3 said".

The only scenario I've seen with regard for the way Tore presented it was in it's actual proper narrative form: "Poor people smell.", Big3 said.
You usually see this in any literature where the narrator is quoting. The narrator doesn't quote his narration, therefore the quotations surround only the quote, and the comma separates the quote from the narration.

Here's Tore's original post;

1. Why? Is she poor?
2. Every home should have one!

That's true. but what I recall from my time in the trenches is that depending on which side of the Atlantic you're on, grammar changes with regard to quotes.

:laughing:

If a person is quoted then it should always be verbatim.
People don't always use correct grammar when speaking.

That makes sense, but in this scenario, Big3 wouldn't have said "Poor people smell, Big3 said". Actually, I take that back. People refer to themselves in third-person all the time.

Exactly. right-track does it all the time.

Anyway, what makes you assume Big3 said it?

It, all the time, right-track does?

Yes, I said "Poor people smell, Big3 said." is wrong, and it is not wrong. I am. It can be written either way.

"Poor people smell, Big3 said." can be used after a dialogue and characters are already established. Also, it would mean that someone else is saying that Big3 is saying it. For example:

"I love poor people," Jane said.
"You're a crazy bitch," John said.
"I don't understand why you would say such a thing."
"Poor people smell, Big3 said."

While "Poor people smell," Big3 said. establishes that Big3 is speaking in 3rd person narrative. When I assumed the original sentence was wrong, I did not take time to think about who the speaker could be. I stand corrected.

The two parts to the quote should be offset from each other regardless of whether it's being narrated or spoken at the time, since it's given as a direct quote (as opposed to indirect, whereupon you would use the qualifier "that"). Hence:

Big3 said, "poor people smell."
OR
"Big3 said, 'poor people smell.'"

The single and double quotes are used interchangeably to distinguish the original speaker from the narrator.

I didn't actually mean to use the quotation marks in any grammatically important context as I was focusing on correct use of the commas. In hindsight, I should've realized they could have caused some confusion. :p:

I think a thing to remember is that even though you are referring to something someone has said, you don't necessarily have a quotation and so you may not have to use quotation marks.

"Poor people smell", Big3 said. This is a quotation, but imagine that Big3 had a long speech about poor people and someone else is just summarizing what his point was.

You didn't see the speech? Well, you didn't miss much. Poor people smell, Big3 said. I guess that's true.

edit :

To Right-Track, I suspect you are right about the use of the word and. In norwegian, I'm pretty sure you can omit the comma as long as you have two full sentences and use and or a select few other words with a similar purpose.

Example :

I am a man and I am over 30 years old.
I am a man, and I am over 30 years old.

I think both these are correct in norwegian although I'm not 100% sure.

Tore, the first sentence is incorrect, according to Purdue OWL, and should probably instead be, "The guy whose buttocks I waxed fell in love with me."

The second sentence (arrggh!) is grammatically correct, although for optimal effect you should probably write, "Boardtracker, a musicbanter tracking bot, is less boring than Erica, even when she attempts to type hot, steamy posts about masturbation to convert all of musicbanter's members into adoring disciples of her lingual gifts."

333, I love writing, too! This butt-sentence is also tricky for me. Since the information that the man's buttocks were waxed seems to be a very important or essential fact about the man and his reasons for falling in love, my thought is that no commas should be used.

In English, the second sentence is correct, following this rule: "Use commas to separate independent clauses when they are joined by any of these seven coordinating conjunctions: and, but, for, or, nor, so, yet."

However, if you were to write, "I am a man and am over 30 years old and am a quirky, rat-loving scientist," then you would not use commas between the verbs or verb phrases that follow the single subject.

Thanks for the grammatical insights, Erica :) I'm thinking the norwegian and english rules are probably not so different after all! I'm thinking people in general being confused or not being consistent with grammar rules, myself included, may have caused some of this confusion.

One, rule, we, have, in, norwegian, grammars, I'm, pretty, sure, is, that, you, can, insert, commas, anywhere, so, if, you're, unsure, you, can, just, go, for, it!

Yes, confusion, can, cause, confusion! ;)

I'm not really a comma expert. I, probably insert them where I, shouldn't

sometimes

FoR EfeCt,