COMMON PUNCTUATION MARKS

Punctuation fills our writing with silent intonation. We pause, stop, emphasize, or question using a comma, a
period, an exclamation point or a question mark.

Correct punctuation adds clarity and precision to writing; it allows the writer to stop, pause, or give emphasis to
certain parts of the sentence.

The standard English punctuation is as follows: period, comma, apostrophe, quotation, question, exclamation,
brackets, braces, parenthesis, dash, hyphen, ellipsis, colon, semicolon.

HYPHENS
What are hyphens?
● Hyphens are used with certain numbers, word parts, and words.
● A hyphen is distinctly shorter than a dash.
● It is only half as long as a dash.

The Uses of Ellipsis

Ellipsis
Ellipses are made up of three periods with spaces between them (. . .) and are used to indicate that material is
missing within a sentence or passage.

Ellipsis Rules 1. Use ellipses to indicate pause in speech. Ellipses can express hesitation, doubt, changes of mood,
suspense, or thoughts trailing off.

#2 Use ellipses to show that a portion of a quoted material has been taken out.

When using an ellipsis, make sure that the resulting text is grammatically correct and maintains the same
meaning as the original.

#3 Pause for dramatic effect or suspense Often, the ellipsis comes before an anticipated part. The idea is to build
suspense before a big reveal.

What is a hyphen?
A hyphen (-) is a punctuation mark that’s used to join words or parts of words. It’s not interchangeable with
other types of dashes.
#1 Writing out the numbers twenty-one through ninety-nine
#2 With fractions used as adjectives
#3 After a prefix that is followed by a proper noun or adjective
#4 In words after prefixes all-, ex-, and self- and in words with suffix -elect
#5 used for certain compound words.
#6 To connect a compound modifier that comes before a noun
Don’t use a hyphen when the modifier comes after the noun it’s describing.
#7 Use hyphens to avoid confusion with another word.

DASHES
What are dashes?
● A dash performs a function that separates certain words, phrases, and clauses from the rest of the sentence.
● A dash sets off material dramatically.
● It is a long horizontal mark made above the writing line (--).

The Uses of Dashes

En dash vs Em dash
En dash:Marking a range
The main use of the en dash is to indicate a range of numbers or a span of time. You can read it as representing
“to” or “through”:

Em dash:Marking a break in a sentence

Em dashes can be used in pairs to mark off additional information that is not essential to understand the
sentence.