Postgraduate Studies

Study Skills : Punctuation

It is important that you use punctuation correctly in all your written work.  Punctuation is designed to help the reader follow what you have written and obviously it is extremely important that the person marking your work can understand what you are trying to say.

Remember, if you have any doubts about grammar, spelling or punctuation, then consult a book (there are plenty of relevant books in the library), the internet, or just ask.  Note also that mistakes in grammar, spelling and punctuation in any submitted piece of written work will often be corrected by the marker.  Therefore you should ensure that you go through your work carefully before it is submitted to get rid of any errors, and again after it has been marked to see if and where you have gone wrong, and to see what suggestions, if any, have been made by the marker.  That way you can ensure that you do not make the same mistake twice. There are very few things more frustrating for a marker than to make detailed corrections only to find that they have been ignored and the same mistakes made again.

Full-Stops

Use full-stops (.) to mark the end of a sentence.  A sentence must have at least one main verb (i.e. a word which conveys an action or a state, e.g. ‘run’, ‘jump’, ‘is’) in it, otherwise it isn’t a sentence.  Note that you do not need to use full-stops after question marks (?).  A question mark is used to show that a sentence is a question, but it also serves to mark the end of that sentence.  Therefore a full-stop is superfluous.  Note also that English happily uses short sentences.  Indeed, it is often better to use several short sentences rather than one long sentence with numerous sub-clauses.  Long sentences with numerous sub-clauses can become difficult to follow, especially if your command of the written word is less than proficient. 

Commas

You should also use commas (,) to divide up a sentence, to mark where sub-clauses begin and end.  For example:

In the consulship of L. Cornelius Scipio, when Sicily was already a suburban province of the Roman people, the war spread further, and they crossed over to Sardinia and the adjoining island of Corsica. (Florus 1.18.15).

The underlined words are the verbs.  As you can see, each of the two sentences (joined by the first ‘and’) has a main verb (‘spread’ and ‘crossed’).  The sub-clause is in italics.  Note how commas have been used to separate the sub-clause from the rest of the sentence.  The sub-clause also has a verb (‘was’).  The end of the whole sentence is marked with a full-stop.

Apostrophes

Special care is needed with the use apostrophes (’) because they have more than one function. 

An apostrophe can be used to mark contraction, e.g. could have is often contracted thus: could’ve.  (N.B. could’ve, should’ve, would’ve etc. are all contracted forms involving the verb ‘have’.  There is no such phrase as ‘could of’, ‘should of’, ‘would of’.  These expressions are wrong.  They stem from lazy pronunciation of contracted forms, coupled with a failure to appreciate that they are actually contracted forms).  In any case, you should avoid using contracted forms in a formal essay.  Write ‘could have’ not ‘could’ve’ etc.

Apostrophes are also used to show possession.  If the word, usually the name of a person, people, city, etc, which is doing the possessing ends in an s, or if it is plural (and so ends in an s), then the apostrophe should go after the s.  If the word does not end in an s, then you should add an apostrophe followed by an s (i.e. the apostrophe goes before the s).  Here are some examples:

Publius’ book (‘the book of Publius’).  ‘Publius’ ends in an s, so the possessive apostrophe must go after the s.

The Romans’ empire (The empire of the Romans).  Romans is plural, so the possessive apostrophe must go after the s.  If you were to put the apostrophe before the s, this would mean that you were referring to the empire of a single Roman (the empire of the Roman).

Caesar’s murderers (the murderers of Caesar).  Since Caesar doesn’t end in an s, one needs to be added after the apostrophe.  If the s were put before the apostrophe, this would mean that there were more than one Caesar (see the example above).  If the apostrophe were left out entirely, this would just look like a plural form and so the reader would have to infer that the s is a possessive s.  In this particular case, there is no real ambiguity (since it is obvious that only one Caesar is involved), but sometimes there can be, because the reader may not necessarily know if the possessor is singular (with the apostrophe left out before the s) or plural (with the apostrophe left out after the s).  E.g.: the Romans army – but is this the army of one individual Roman (the Roman’s army), or of many Romans (the Romans’ army)?

Note that some plurals are not formed by the addition of an s.  E.g. the plural of fungus is fungi.  In this case, you’ll need to add a possessive apostrophe and then an s (i.e. the apostrophe goes before the s).

Some further points to note about the use of apostrophes:

• Plurals are usually formed in English by the addition of an s.  E.g. one book, two books.  There is no need to use an apostrophe here.  Apostrophes are not used to distinguish singular nouns from plural nouns (nouns are words used to name things, such as books in the example given).
• The possessive form of it is its, without an apostrophe.  Possessive apostrophes are never used with the word it.  It’s is the contracted form of it is.  The form its’  (with the apostrophe after the s) does not exist.

If there is something you think should be added or changed in these pages, please contact Errietta Bissa.

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