Punctuation, Part 2

Sometimes You Gotta Break the Rules

Sean "Legibility is terribly street." (8/5/2008) via Flickr. Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic License

I will analyze three more topics I found in the "Punctuation" section of Rules For Writers that I could improve upon.

Comma     ,

• Do not use a comma to set off a concluding adverb clause that is essential to the meaning of the sentence
• Do not use commas to set off restrictive or mildly parenthetical elements
• Do not use a comma between compound elements that are not independent clauses
• My punctuation: The author employs emotionally compelling narratives to change her audience’s perspective of religious texts, provide an example of ‘inappropriate’ material, and create a tangible connection between access to spiritual texts and development of youths." 
• I usually use commas correctly. But overall, the massive rules and exclusions that apply to commas always confuse me, so I tend to use them whenever a pause is needed in a sentence for flow or clarity. This means that sometimes I break these rules, but they usually seem like they'd be perfectly fine uses of the comma... I'm a bit stubborn about changing how I use commas because it would become too tedious for me to write according to every little rule and obey each exception to it.

Quotation Marks     "   "

• Colons and semicolons
• My punctuation: Amal’s trepidation, “I can’t sleep from stressing about whether I’ve got the guts to do it. To wear the hijab full-time.”; her friends’ reaction, “ [they thought I wasn’t really] into the whole Muslim thing” and her teacher’s assumptions, “She adds to Amal’s distress by mistakenly assuming that she  is a victim, forced by her family to adhere to Muslim doctrine.” all create a situation a majority of young adults and her audience can relate to.
• I thought that colons and semicolons would be same as commas - that they should be placed inside the quotation marks for proper punctuation - but it seems that they are a special case and I will make a note of it when I compose sentences around quotes.

Dash     -

• Set off parenthetical material that deserves emphasis
• Set off appositives that contain commas
• Introduce a list, restatement, amplification, or a dramatic shift in tone or thought
• My punctuation: She creates a distinction between the two - “A person most often inherits religion but makes a conscious decision to be spiritual.” - which combines with the definition to create a sense of inclusion.
• Recently, I've begun to incorporate the dash more in my writing, and I'm glad to learn the uses of this punctuation. Hopefully, I can effectively incorporate what I've used in my writing, but for now I'll do my best to remember these functions of the dash and work from there.