A few weeks ago, I mentioned in this space that serial commas, also called Oxford commas, are a matter of style. So either “red, white and blue” or “red, white, and blue” can be correct depending on ...

When you reach the end of a sentence, you need a period, question mark, or exclamation point. Phrases or subordinate clauses standing alone are missing a subject or a verb or are stated in such a way ...

You can get Samuel Beckett’s most famous comma splice (absent commas) on a T-shirt or coffee mug Because the conventions for their use are so variable, commas can provide a quick sense of a writer’s ...

Sex. Now that I have your attention, I’d like to discuss the fact that this sentence you’re reading is not necessarily a run-on sentence because run-on sentences are not simply sentences that run on ...

It’s just a comma, my friend complained to me last week while I was editing her essay. I had told her, politely but firmly, that one of her sentences was incorrect without a comma; she did not take it ...