how to use punctuation marks in a sentence

commas I have a confession to make. I have a soft-corner for punctuation marks. These elegant symbols silently provide order and meaning to words. Unfortunately, these marks are often misused by people who write business emails, reports, and things like that.

Here are seven things about punctuation which you must know:

Space is a part of punctuation. Yes, it is. So, make sure that there are enough blank spaces in your writing. Remember what you learnt at school: there must be space in between paragraphs. If you are writing a report, make sure that there is sufficient space around headings, sub-headings, diagrams, and charts.
When introducing a list, use a dash (–) or a colon (:). Do not use a dash and then a colon. Here is a specimen: :– In India, people use this colon-dash monster combination quite regularly. If you are guilty of this. Stop it! And if someone you know does this, tell them about it. Why use extra punctuation?

3. Full-stop. You know this one.

At the end of a sentence, use a full-stop. In this age of SMSing and other forms of instant communication, busy people sometimes forget

(Did you notice the missing full-stop?)

4. & reads as ampersand. We use it in business names, especially for partnerships. For example, McKinsey & Company, and Mahindra & Mahindra.

When writing an office email, use and to join two words or two sentences. And, do not use &.

If you are writing to friends, use & as many times as you like.

5. A semicolon joins two sentences related in meaning.

Here is an example:

The new team has been finalized; we are meeting this Monday.

Do not, and I mean do not, use semicolons in any other way.

For example:

~~The attachments are; minutes of the meeting, audio files, market research.~~

As you can see from the above example, you cannot use a semicolon to introduce a list. That is not part of that punctuation mark’s job description.

6. Use exclamation marks sparingly. If you are excited or shocked about something, one ! will do. If you use more (!!!) then exclamation-inflation starts to happen. Every additional exclamation mark rapidly decreases in value. Do not let that happen!

7. Ellipsis…

That is what those three dots are called. They are used to indicate missing words in a text. And of course, some people use them for effect…

If you do use them, restrict yourself to three dots. There are people in this world who use five or six dots. One, two, three. And no more.

For more on misused punctuation marks, visit this post. And if you are curious to know more about semicolons, read this.

Misused punctuation marks

1. Semicolon

The semicolon is used to divide two sentences that are in some way related to each other. The key word is ‘sentence’. There has to be a sentence on both sides of a semicolon. Here are two examples:

I enjoy punctuation; the semicolon is my favourite mark. (correct usage)

I enjoy punctuation; the semicolon. (incorrect usage)

When you use a semicolon, think about whether it divides two sentences or not. What is a sentence? I hear you ask. A sentence is a group of words that:

a. has a subject and a verb;

b. makes complete sense on its own.

2. Exclamation marks!

Note that I used just one exclamation mark for the sub-heading. One exclamation mark is more than enough.

Do not write: !!!

Of course, in informal communication, you can use a series of exclamation marks. On WhatsApp, you can type: I passed the test!!! But, even here, the value of your exclamation marks starts to fall if you use too many of them.

Using too many exclamation marks dilutes the impact of your message. From now on, be mindful when using these marks.

Why do women use exclamation marks three times as much than men? Find out.

3. The use of the dash and colon

There are many uses of these punctuation marks, but I have one particular use in mind. When introducing a list, many people in India start with :–

That is redundant, and a bit heavy.

Either go with the colon (:), or go with the dash (–). Why go with both? That makes your writing unnecessarily heavy.