Punctuations
1. Apostrophe (’)
to indicate possession
1) With nouns (plural and singular) not ending in an s add 's.
the children's books, the people's parliament, a Mother's pride
2) With plural nouns ending in an s, add only the apostrophe.
the guards' duties, the Nuns' habits, the Joneses' house
3) With singular nouns ending in an s, you can add either 's or an
apostrophe alone.
the witness's lie or the witness' lie (be consistent)
Exception: ancient or religious names.
Jesus' strength, Achilles' heel
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For common possession
only add 's to the last name.
Janet and Jane's house
Where possession is not common, add to each.
Janet's and Jane's homes
Pronouns
With the exception of one's, pronouns (its, his, hers)
do not require an apostrophe. Yours not your’s
to indicate contractions ( I’ll, I’m, it’s = it is/has
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Where letters or numbers have been omitted.
the summer of '69, the house wasn't at its best, that isn't the right
way, it's not bad. Six O’clock
Special plurals
Words which do not have usually plurals sometimes have an
apostrophe when a plural form is written,
It’s a nice idea, but there are a lot of if’s
apostrophe are used in plurals of letters, and often of numbers and
abbreviation
He writes b’s instead of d’s.
I know two MP’s personally or MPs
It was in the early 1960’s.
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2. Brackets/ Parentheses ()
for additional information or explanation
• 1) To clarify or inform.
Jamie's bike was red (bright red) with a yellow stripe.
• 2) For asides and comments
The bear was pink (I kid you not).
• 3) around numbers or letters in text.
Our objectives are (1) to increase output,(2) to
improve quality…
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3 comma (,)
• between a list of three or more words
• To replace the word and for all but the last instance.
Up, down, left and right.
• before a conjunction
• 1) When but or for are used.
I did my best to protect the camp, but the bears were too
aggressive.
• 2) When and or or are used the comma is optional.
The flag is red, white, and blue. [known as the Oxford
comma]
The sizes are small, medium or large.
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to give additional information
• 1) To indicate contrast.
The snake was brown, not green, and it was quite small.
• 2) Where the phrase could be in brackets.
The recipe, which we hadn't tried before, is very easy to
follow.
• 3) Where the phrase adds relevant information.
Mr Hardy, 68, ran his first marathon five years ago.
• 4) Where the addition is not necessary to the meaning
of the sentence.
Mr Hardy, who enjoys bird watching, ran his first
marathon five years ago.
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• 5) Where the main clause of the sentence is dependent
on the preceding clause.
If at first you don't succeed, give up.
Though the snake was small, I still feared for my life.
for opening phrases, conjunctive verbs, etc.
• 1) Introductory or opening phrases.
In general, sixty-eight is quite old to run a marathon.
On the whole, snakes only
By the way, did you hear about him?
Oh, so that’s where it was
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2) Conjunctive verbs.
Unfortunately, the bear was already in a bad mood
and, furthermore, pink wasn't its colour.
• 3) Following for example, that is, etc
You should use commas, for example, around 'for
example'.
There are some exceptions: namely, when using
abbreviations.
• To separate question Tags from the rest of the
sentence.
It is quite expensive, isn’t it?
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where a pause is required
1) To make the reading more natural.
Whatever happens, don't panic.
• 2) To avoid confusion.
To Margaret, Jenny left her favorite book.
• in address or quotation
• 1) When addressing someone by name.
So, Murray, I'm sending you to Outer Mongolia.
• 2) When quoting direct speech.
And then the boss said, ‘I'm sending you to Outer Mongolia.’
• to indicate the omission of a word or phrase
• Use too much sugar and the mixture will be sweet, [use] too
little and it will be sour.
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4 Colon (:)
• before a list, summary or quote
• 1) Before a list.
I could only find three of the ingredients: sugar, flour and coconut.
• 2) Before a summary.
To summarise: we found the camp, set up our tent and then the
bears attacked.
• 3) Before a quote.
As Jane Austen wrote: it is a truth universally acknowledged, that a
single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a
wife.
• to complete a statement of fact
• Where the colon is used in place of the following or thus.
There are only three kinds of people: the good, the bad and the
ugly.
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5 semi-colon (;)
• to link two separate sentences that are closely
related
• The children came home today; they had been
away for a week.
• in a list that already contains commas
• Star Trek, created by Gene Roddenberry; Babylon
5, by JMS; Buffy, by Joss Whedon; and Farscape,
from the Henson Company.
•
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6 Hyphen (-)
• with some prefixes and suffixes
• 1) To avoid multiple letters.
re-evaluate [reevaluate], co-operation
• 2) If the root word is capitalized.
pre-Christmas, anti-European
• 3) With specific prefixes and suffixes.
self-sacrificing, all-seeing, ex-wife, vice-chairman,
president-elect
• 4) To avoid ambiguity or awkward pronunciation.
un-ionised [unionised], re-read
• 5) Where a list of words each have the same prefix or
suffix.
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pre- and post-recession, over- and under-weight12
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to form compound words
• 1) For clarity.
sit-in, stand-out, Mother-In-Law
• 2) In compound adjectives that modify what they
precede.
blue-chip company, devil-may-care attitude, up-to-the-
minute news
• with fractions, numbers and initial letters
• 1) With fractions and numbers between 21 and 99.
one-half, sixty-four, twenty-eight and three-quarters
• 2) Words that start with a capital letter
X-ray, T-shirt, U-Turn
• to divide words at the right hand margin.
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7 Dash( — )
• for emphasis
• The book was great — a really good read.
• for explanation or addition
• In place of brackets or commas.
The Colour Of Magic — the first of the series
— was written in 1989.
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8 slash/oblique
To separate alternative words or phrases
Have pudding/ cheese
Single/married/widowed/divorced
in internet and email addresses to separate
different elements( often said forward
‘forward slash)
http://www.oup.com/elt/
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9 Square brackets []
• Around words inserted to make a quotation
grammatically correct:
Britain in [these] years was with out…
10. Exclamation mark !
At the end of a sentence expressing surprise, joy, anger, shock or
another strong emotion
That’s marvelous!
Never! She cried.
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11 ellipsis
• to indicate missing words in a quotation
• ‘the sight was awesome...truly amazing’
12. Question mark
At the end of direct question not indirect
Especially with a date to express doubt:
John Marston(?1575-1634)
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13 Full stop(period)
• At the end of sentence
I knocked again.
• Sometimes in abbreviation
Jan. e.g. a.m. etc.
• In internet and email address( said dot)
http:// www.oup.com
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• 14. Capital letters
1) Proper Noun (names of person, places, countries,
rivers)
2) The names of the days and months
e.g. Wednesday, February
3) The name of religions. e.g. Islam, Muslim, Hindu,
Hinduism
4) The name of Languages. e.g. Urdu, French, English
5) Any word made from the name of a country.
e.g. Pakistani, Frenchman
6. The first letter inside inverted commas.
I said to him, “Go Said
e.g.10/10/2020 M-HITEC University
away.” 19
7. The important words in the title of a book, film or
stories
e.g. I saw a film called ‘The King and the Robbers’
8. The titles of persons
e.g. the President of Pakistan, the Shah of Iran
9. The first letter in a line of poetry.
‘To be weak is miserable
Doing or suffering
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