Grammar is dominant partner
In grammar-punctuation marriage

People talk about grammar and punctuation as if they were inseparable, yet treat them as if they were unrelated. In reality, teaching punctuation is impossible without first teaching grammar.

What punctuation is

Punctuation is a set of symbols for indicating how readers should interpret written language.

We usually think only of marks like commas and colons as punctuation, but capital letters and empty spaces are part of the punctuation arsenal, too. You can see that without those spaces between words, itwouldbeveryhardtoreadwrittenwork.

Punctuation bounds sentences

Capital letters and ending punctuation give readers valuable help in deciphering the meaning of a piece of writing. They do that by marking sentence boundaries.

An upper case letter is the symbol for left boundary of a sentence. The right boundary of a sentence is always marked by ending punctuation. Usually that ending punctuation is a period or question mark.

Without proper punctuation, readers may misunderstand where a sentence begins and ends. How quickly can you find the sentence units in the following?

janet turned the fire off angry words in an e-mail had ruined her day while she stood at the sink the sun was going down.

Can you imagine trying to sort out the meaning of lengthy prose passages that lack punctuation?

It is true that capital letters and periods can have other symbolic uses. However, combined with other grammatical sentence indicators, they assure readers that the writer intended the material between the capital letter and the period to be viewed as a sentence.

If writers' grammar and punctuation skills are poor, they may indicate something is a sentence that readers know cannot possibly be a sentence. We will open that can of worms later when we discuss sentence boundaries.

Word function markers

The English language is chock full of words that can have totally different meanings depending on their grammatical function in a sentence.

Take the word fire, for example. It means different things in each of these contexts:

• Light the fire.

• The boss will fire a dishonest employee.

• Fire off an angry email, and you may regret it later.

• The novelist's work has real fire.

Punctuation subtly lets readers know how a word functions in a sentence.

If you were trying to read that block of unpunctuated prose I showed you earlier, you might have to read it a couple times to figure out how the word fire is used there. Look again:

Janet turned the fire off angry words in an e-mail had ruined her day while she stood at the sink the sun was going down.

Add punctuation and you see quickly how the word is used.

Janet turned the fire off. Angry words in an email had ruined her day. While she stood at the sink, the sun was going down.

People understand grammar through punctuation.

Commas tell a tale

Commas are not used for decoration. They help readers understand writing content.

A comma indicates that the elements on either side of the comma are logically separate entities. For example, look at these two sentences:

• Marie bought pumpkin, bread, and cream cheese.

• Annette bought pumpkin bread and cream cheese.

The commas tell readers that Marie bought three separate items while Annette bought only two.

In grammatical terminology, the commas in the first sentence indicate that pumpkin, bread, and cheese are each to be viewed as nouns. The absence of commas in the second sentence indicates that pumpkin and cream are both to be understood as adjectives.

Grammar bosses punctuation

I'm sure you have heard people say to put a comma in a sentence "where you would breathe if you were reading it aloud."

Bad advice.

Punctuation should not be governed by a writer's lung capacity.

Let me prove that assertion.

During the 2008 presidential primaries, I was drowsily getting breakfast when I heard a newscaster read this news item:

Barack Obama awoke this morning in Cleveland, site of last night's debate, with Hillary Clinton.

That news woke me up.

It took me a minute to realize that what I had heard was not the latest political sex scandal. The newscaster simply took a breath in the wrong place. A comma definitely did not belong where the newscaster took a breath.

Grammar bosses punctuation

Punctuation should not be inserted "where you breathe." Insert punctuation where grammar rules say to put punctuation.

Writers cannot write in good grammar without punctuation. What's more, they cannot punctuate appropriately without knowing some studied grammar.

Clearly, the next step is to determine which grammar punctuation rules are absolutely essential for writers to know.