Punctuation, Part 2

In the following blog post, I will be examining three more punctuation topics found in Rules for Writers and examine my own draft to better my understanding of the punctuation topics and reflect on what I learned from my draft.

~Blu~,"What", 1/2/12 via Flickr.com

The Comma:

I thought that I was familiar with the use of the comma, but to know the technical terms and situations that it applies in are incredibly useful to spotting where they apply in my writing. This section surprised my in the sheer number of different situations a comma should be present in, but most of them I was already practicing, though not particularly aware.

After reading through my draft for comma's specifically, I found that they had the tendency to lead to run on sentences that were too complex for their own good. I removed some of my commas because they allowed for a change in sentence structure and broke up some very dense areas of text.


The Apostrophe:

I have had a poor understanding of apostrophe and possession for the longest time. After reading this section, I have a much better understanding of what situations there is possession that indicates an apostrophe. The advice of when to avoid using an apostrophe was also very useful, such as plural numbers and years.

Based on my new understanding of possession, I was able to make a lot more grammatical changes for the sake of possession and pluralization. I feel into the habit of reversing the two and adding apostrophes for plurals and not possession.


End Punctuation:

This section was not particularly insightful. Most people are familiar with the three end punctuation. The specific feelings that each can evoke was a useful portion in trying to find a situation in which they can be used.

After going through my essay, there weren't many circumstances where I could use any other punctuation but the period. I could have used a question mark for a rhetorical question posed to my audience, but most times I tried, it seemed forced and unnatural.