Comments | grammar_pandas: A question of preference:

virtuistic in grammar_pandas

A question of preference:

Sep 19, 2006 16:03

Poll I do believe in commas..

Comments 9

kibbles September 19 2006, 22:07:27 UTC

My then ten year old daughter was berated for not using a serial comma, as she was taught in NYC. Her teacher here in Iowa used it as an excuse to slam NYC, my daughter, and all people who do not use serial commas, as it was never correct. She did not state that it was her preference or the school's preference, but that it was never correct to omit the serial comma.

virtuistic September 20 2006, 00:59:08 UTC

I think that is extremely reprehensible. I'm sorry to hear it.

eloisem September 19 2006, 22:17:59 UTC

I chose the third one, but I actually have a slightly different take on the serial comma. I personally like to omit it, but there are times when I feel that it is essential. For instance, let's say I had a long sentence with a list of things that might have two things that are part of one item, then I would insist on a serial comma to clarify meaning and to make it look nicer.

"The city needs to submit financial documents, plans and specifications, and environmental impact reports."

That is pretty much the only time I like to see the serial comma.

virtuistic September 20 2006, 00:56:07 UTC

I sometimes feel that it's always helpful? It just keeps everything clear. Especially in cases like the following:

"This memo pertains to employees in the following departments: order fulfillment, customer service, marketing, media and print advertising."

Now, is it "customer service, marketing, media, and print advertising"? Is "media and print advertising" one department in itself, thus needing to be "and media and print advertising"?

eloisem September 20 2006, 02:21:56 UTC

Well this is one of the cases where I'd like to see the comma there to clarify meaning. For the most part though, I like to leave the serial comma out because the "and" is basically replacing the comma.

mari_mac1109 September 20 2006, 03:40:21 UTC

I would be very inclined to agree with you.

melange_fiesta September 20 2006, 11:27:47 UTC

Up until I was 13 or 14 I had not used the serial comma, and this was a solid grammatical rule for me. Then I had a teacher who used to mark up ALL my papers with a serial comma for EVERY sentence I left it out of. So, very reluctantly, I switched to the serial comma. Now I'm just used to the serial comma, so that's what I use. Plus, as others have pointed out, it does clarify meaning where things are a bit awkwardly worded -- so if I use the serial comma all the time, there'll never be any confusion! :P

virtuistic September 20 2006, 17:22:23 UTC

That's my argument for it as well! :)

chronovore May 23 2007, 02:01:07 UTC

That's pretty much what I learned as well. I'd not heard it referred to as a serial comma until this thread; I didn't know it was optional until recently, where I heard it referred to as The Oxford Comma.

I can't bring myself to /not/ use it, and my sister, who is a teacher, can't stand the sight of them being used.