Path: utzoo!hoptoad!amdcad!decwrl!ucbvax!dewey.soe.berkeley.edu!robinson From: robinson@dewey.soe.berkeley.edu (Michael Robinson) Newsgroups: alt.flame Subject: Adult illiteracy (was Re: Theological Debates) Summary: ...and again, and again, and again, and... Keywords: Comma Message-ID: <22543@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU> Date: 12 Jan 88 12:03:00 GMT References: <4062@uwmcsd1.UUCP> <514@gethen.UUCP> <4080@uwmcsd1.UUCP> <22421@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU> <4107@uwmcsd1.UUCP> <550@gethen.UUCP> <4136@uwmcsd1.UUCP> Sender: usenet@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Reply-To: robinson@dewey.soe.berkeley.edu.UUCP (Michael Robinson) Distribution: alt.flame Organization: School of Education, UC-Berkeley Lines: 103 In article <4136@uwmcsd1.UUCP> markh@csd4.milw.wisc.edu (Mark William Hopkins) writes: > >Maybe... just maybe, I am completely off. I always thought commas did the >following things: > > separate conjoined clauses whenever it is natural to make a short pause there > (i.e. sepatate conjoined clauses that are long); > for listings (such as this one), > including listings such as > a list of NOUNS, VERBS, ADJECTIVES or PHRASES of the same type > DATE MONTH, YEAR > CITY, STATE; > to delimit parentheticals, such as appositives; >-->TO SEPARATE INTRODUCTORIES: > introductory words, > introductory phrases, phrases displaced at the beginning >because it is natural to pause there; I get it. This is New Grammar. It must be like New Math, only more debilitating in its effects. The only rules of comma placement in this New Grammar seem to be to stuff a comma in whenever you stop talking (as long as you don't stop too long). I feel ripped off. They made me learn about coordinating conjunctions and appositives and all that. And what the hell is an "introductory phrase?" "Once upon a time...?" Since when did phrases start getting displaced at the beginning because it is natural to pause there? Displaced by what? Automation? >...and just for your information, semi-colons do NOT separate clauses >differently (in most cases) than a comma does. The primary function of >semi-colon, which denotes a slightly longer pause than a comma does, is to >separate those things that a comma separates whenever the "comma-clash" >ambiguity would otherwise result. I wonder where the New Grammarians came up with this one. Don't they realize they are going to confuse everyone who learned that semicolons separate main clauses not joined by a coordinating conjunction and commas separate main phrases joined by coordinating conjunctions? And what is "comma-clash." It sounds like a Cambridge punk-rock band. > Also, the only real purpose of a colon (apart from special uses such >as denoting time) is to introduce listings, or quotations. It's "meaning" >is to serve as a "pointer" to what comes next. The only thing you're right >about is the period (but not all sentences end in a period. Some end in a >colon). Just out of curiousity, Mr. Remedial, how does one punctuate an illustrative or clarifying phrase in New Grammar? We Old Grammar types always used colons in the past. > The way I learned things (in high school, since I tested out of the >college courses (what's your excuse?!)) was that all these forms of punctuation >denoted pauses of lengths in the order from shortest to longest: > > COMMA SEMI-COLON COLON PERIOD Well, Mr. Remedial, I think you have provided the best argument for remedial classes for incoming freshmen I've ever seen. Also, you've explained the inconsistancy between the caliber of the University of Wisconsin, and the caliber of your grammatical knowledge. Perhaps it never occured to you that these Romper-Room [TM] grammatical rules were not rules at all, but rather general guidelines introduced by haggard high-school teachers as a compromise between the impossible task of teaching the complex rules of English grammar to the militantly uneducated, and the unpalatable consequence of releasing them on the streets with no grammatical understanding whatsoever. >I easily admit my mistakes, wherever I make them. But I will not stand for >nit-pickers who are so busy looking up (and misreading) syntax rules on >inessential details that they can't even see what they are talking about. >There were no mistakes in either of the citations. Just out of curiousity, when was the last time you read (from your comment, one would assume read correctly) the rules of English grammar from an AUTHORITATIVE source? For that matter, can you provide ANY source which corroborates your fascinating assertions. >>Expletives, when used, are >>followed with exclamation points, not commas. If you had written "Maybe! >>I ought to clarify myself ..." or "Maybe. I ought to clarify myself ...", >>then you would have been right. As it is, you are not. > >If I had written any of these, I would not be writing what I wanted to write. >They mean completely different things, again: semantics. If you intend to communicate anything at all, you ought to consider the difficulties presented when using a mapping from grammar to semantics which is radically different from that used by the rest of the English speaking world. >>What you ought to have clarified is your position or your statement. Neither >>seems particularly clear so far. >> >That's understandable, given who is reading my postings: Namely people who don't spend all their time testing out of classes, but actually learning something. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Michael Robinson USENET: ucbvax!ernie!robinson ARPA: robinson@ernie.berkeley.edu