If you’re like most people and did not learn the rules of grammar and punctuation in school, you probably rely on osmosis and instinct to express your ideas clearly.
If you write a lot for your jobs or career, you likely manage to express your ideas just fine. Yet there are times when you may not be completely sure about something and have to take a “cross your fingers and hope for the best” approach.
The hard truth is this: if you’re a writer, academic, small business owner, or simply someone whose ability as a communicator is evaluated by how you write, it’s essential you know your way around how to wield your only tool.
Without having a firm grasp of the rules may at times not only feel uncomfortable but set you up for some inadvertent missteps along the way that could damage your reputation or credibility.
Learning a few basics will set you up for greater success. The first and most fundamental step to clear, authoritative writing that also considers your reader’s experience, so they too intuit your authority, is learning how to use the comma.
While there are 12 rules for using commas, you should begin by understanding the 3 reasons we need commas for clear writing in the first place
In English, to impart an idea, we group words into units of information, which are either independent self-standing units, or dependent units whose raison d’être is to enhance other independent units. We group units inside of a container, or a sentence, to share information. A sentence can contain anywhere from one unit to several.
A single-unit sentence is called a simple sentence.
• I like reading before bed.
• Glasses help people see better.
When a sentence contains two or more units, that’s called a complex or compound sentence.
• Even though Ellen has risen to the top of her field, I have never seen her be unkind to anyone, which says a lot about her character. (3 units)
The units inside a complex or compound sentence are linked to each other with commas and small buffers/joiners that are adverbs, adverbial phrases, or coordinating conjunctions.
• She understood what was happening, but she wished it weren’t happening at all.
• Tim’s speech knocked the other panelists’ socks off, yet he realized afterward he’d forgotten one important element.
• Although the restaurant was half empty, we still had to wait 15 minutes for a table.
Note: when two independent units are linked with a comma, there must also be a small buffer word or phrase following the comma.
In a single-unit sentence, no comma is needed.
• Our kid is a late bloomer.
• I can’t speak to anyone until after my first coffee.
But in a two or multi-unit sentence, commas keep the units distinct.
• That blue coffee cup on the counter is my favorite, but you can use it if you’d like.
⇨ That blue coffee cup on the counter is my favorite- one unit
⇨ you can use it if you’d like.- one unit
Lest you think this tiny punctuation mark isn’t that big of a deal, incorrect use or missing commas have been responsible for misreading or misinterpretations of texts. (Notably in recent years were a few high-profile court cases that required companies to dole out millions of dollars due to missing commas in contracts, resulting in altered meanings of sentences).
Other misreading events, while perhaps not expensive, can make a text funny. Being funny on purpose is awesome, but if you’re not trying for it, you can undermine the perceived value of your work and cost yourself reputation points.
Most misreading comes from absent commas between an adverbial phrase and a sentence unit, around nouns of direct address (people’s names), or in a series of items or phrases (called either a “serial” comma or an “Oxford comma”).
• Throw another log on Uncle John! (Throw another log on, Uncle John!)
• Hop on Carol when you’re ready. (Hop on, Carol, when you’re ready.)
• Rachael Ray finds inspiration in cooking her family and her dog. (From a doctored Tails magazine cover, Oct. 2010)
(Note: The real cover was written correctly as “Rachael Ray finds inspiration in cooking, her family, and her dog.”)
• Snack on food lovers. (Snack on, food lovers.)
• Most of the time travellers worry about their luggage. (Most of the time, travellers worry about their luggage.)
A presentation with a written component, writing delivered to your team or client, or an article or blog published on the web that contains one of these errors can cost you. As the saying goes, we want people laughing with us, not at us!
When we string two or more units together in a sentence, at the comma is where the reader will take a contextual pause. This pause naturally occurs as the reader transitions from one unit to the next. During that pause, the reader will unconsciously take a breath, particularly if the units are on the longer side.
Readers take their cue as to how to read a text from the way it is written. This means the writer is responsible for indicating to your reader where they can breathe.
Lest you think that’s nonsense (after all, they’re reading silently, not speaking!), here’s how it works:
When a reader reads, they unconsciously adopt the breathing patterns as indicated in the rises and falls of the sentences. If you don’t give the reader commas to indicate where to breathe, it is jarring for the reader (or even dangerous!). Without proper places to take in a breath, a reader will be shaken out of the world of the text by the friction of their body’s needs not being met and the writing and have to forcibly override the text’s rhythm to find their own breathing pattern. So awkward.
Another important reason we need to know how commas work is so we follow the rules for clear writing rather than write (and punctuate) the same way we speak.
The difference in how we would punctuate written text vs. spoken text is substantial.
Modern speech is full of pauses for dramatic impact. Were a writer to use commas in their writing the way they pause while they speak, their text would feel breathless and the units unclear or tangled.
For example, if, you were to write the way you speak, there would, be commas, all over the place and, your reader, while they’d hear the fits and starts—indicative of a modern speaker—they might also feel like, they’re in a car with a teenager, learning to drive stick shift. The effect on your reader, is that they, hyperventilate.
In dialogue, if your character speaks this way, you’d illustrate that with incorrect commas to show their speech pattern. But in regular narration or a nonfiction text, you’d want to keep your comma use standard.
The flip side to using too many commas is using too few or omitting them altogether if you’re not sure where they go.
In this case, the units become a giant blob and the reader may run out of air whilst reading and possibly die. Additionally the reader may misunderstand the text so not only are they headed for the great beyond they’re doing so ill-informed. A double indignity.
Our job as writers is to invite readers into our personal space that we create, where we give them the metaphorical equivalent of a warm drink, a comfortable seat, and good background music. If you muck up your sentences and your reader struggles for air, or worse, runs out of air and passes out, you’ve failed in the literary hospitality department, and seriously.
Like you, your reader also probably didn’t learn grammar in school. But they do know when what they’re reading is a little tangled, gappy, and forces them to double back to understand the ideas, and when they’re in the presence of writing that is clear, clean, and pleasant to read.
The entire purpose of adhering to the rules of good writing, namely using the 3 reasons we need commas for clear writing, is to rest your ideas on a shared foundation that all readers can reliably count on as a baseline for clear communication.
If you wing the writing and miss the mark (literally and figuratively), your reader may feel confused, odd or uncomfortable enough to mistrust the work’s quality, and doubt your ability as a communicator at large.
Yet when you follow the rules (while still enjoying your own lyrical style), your reader will be comfortable and happily let go of their real lives to sink into whatever it is you’ve provided on the page, whether it’s information, a new world, or your perspective on an idea. That perception of authority and competence will make them feel happy and smarter, and let them to sit back, relax, and allow you to take them somewhere new.
Got a comma question? Share it below in the comments!
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4 Responses
Poor Uncle John. Great video! Looking forward to more!
Yes, Yes. Yes.
I want to be a grammar nerd. Can’t wait for the next comma drama. Take care.
Marianne
I thought that the presentation was excellent a d the information concise and complete. I particularly enjoyed that.therewas a bit of humor in it. It held my interest for the entire time. Well done, bor anyone who writes anything.
Thanks so much for your sweet comment, Lois!