Mr. Grammar Rant inverts a comma

Apostrophe Protection Society

A question comes to us from a former student – let’s call her Gwendolyn – who works in the communications department of a small public relations firm in Small Town, Ontario, not far from Quaint, in the township of Middleoftheroad. Gwendolyn writes: “Mr. Grammar Rant, my boss is a lovely person and a great boss, but she has no idea how to use the apostrophe! She insists on writing Tim Hortons and Starbucks, and ‘youre’ when she means ‘you’re,’ and she refuses to listen to me when I try to correct her, telling me that I’m too young and inexperienced in syntactical matters to know anything about apostrophes! Can you please help?”

Of course we here at Mr. Grammar Rant can help! And we help by pointing Gwendolyn and her obdurate boss to http://www.apostrophe.org.uk/. This excellent and heart-warming organization was, according to it’s web site, “started in 2001 by John Richards, now its Chairman, with the specific aim of preserving the correct use of this currently much abused punctuation mark in all forms of text written in the English language.” It’s enough to bring a tear of gratitude to the eye, a tremble of warm emotion to the lip and – dare I say it? – a soft glow of affection, to the most jaded and hardened ink-stained editorial wretch. Just knowing that there is someone out there in Networld who has taken on the onerous and thankless job of guarding our time-honoured use of the neglected and misused apostrophe makes it possible for the rest of us to sleep more soundly at night, doesn’t it?

Note and appreciate the beauty of the following:

“The rules concerning the use of apostrophes in written English are very simple:

1. They are used to denote a missing letter or letters, for example:

	I can’t instead of I cannot
	I don’t instead of I do not
	it’s instead of it is

2. They are used to denote possession, for example:

	the dog’s bone
	the company’s logo
	Jones’s bakery (but Joneses’ bakery if owned by more than one Jones)

… but please note that the possessive form of it does not take an apostrophe any more than ours, yours or hers do

the bone is in its mouth

… however, if there are two or more dogs, companies or Joneses in our example, the apostrophe comes after the ‘s’:

	the dogs’ bones
	the companies’ logos
	Joneses’ bakeries

3. Apostrophes are NEVER ever used to denote plurals!  Common examples of such abuse (all seen in real life!) are:

	Banana’s for sale which of course should read Bananas for sale
	Menu’s printed to order which should read Menus printed to order
	MOT’s at this garage which should read MOTs at this garage
	1000′s of bargains here! which should read 1000s of bargains here!
	New CD’s just in! which should read New CDs just in!
	Buy your Xmas tree’s here! which should read Buy your Xmas trees here!

Note: Special care must be taken over the use of your and you’re as they sound the same but are used quite differently:
your is possessive as in this is your pen
you’re is short for you are as in you’re coming over to my house

We are aware of the way the English language is evolving during use, and do not intend any direct criticism of those who have made the mistakes above.  We are just reminding all writers of English text, whether on notices or in documents of any type, of the correct usage of the apostrophe should you wish to put right mistakes you may have inadvertently made.”

So take heart, dear Gwendolyn, your boss can be made to see the light, and she, and perhaps you, may indeed want to joint this august company of literati who strive to maintain a high standard of English language use.

Up the apostrophe!

Sincerely,

Mr. Grammar Rant

Mr. Grammar rant recommends…

With the seasonal holidays nearly upon us, we here at Mr. Grammar Rant are pleased to offer the following short list of must-read books for all those looking for an engaging and entertaining way to spend days at the airports, socked in at snow bound hotels, or, one hopes, storm-stranded at home in front of the fireplace with the dogs curled on the couch. Yes, let the dogs up on the couch, after all, they’re people too.

Topping our list this year is “Comma Sutra: Position Yourself for Success with Good Grammar” by Laurie Rozakis, Ph.D. Published in 2005, this little tongue-in-cheek book is a delightful and slightly naughty romp through the “quickie Faux pas fixes and kinky wordplay (that)… gives you instant grammar gratification.” Any book that can help improve readers’ syntactical skills while at the same time making them feel like they should slam the pages shut every time someone comes into room has got to be a must read. We recommend you read it on the bus – you’re bound to become involved in interesting conversations.

British writer and editor Jeremy Butterfield’s little tome “Damp Squid: the English Language Laid Bare” sounds naughty, but is in fact a very scholarly and often humorous little book that is “…fascinating to those who would really like to find out how the English language is behaving. Clearly written and informative, it is a lively guide to that most creative and challenging language, English.”

Third on our list is the fabulously witty and very intelligent “Woe is I: The Grammarphobe’s Guide to Better English in Plain English, Second Edition (Paperback). Written by Patricia T. O’Conner, an editor at the New York Times Book Review, Woe Is I gives lighthearted, witty instruction on grammar. The following is from Publishers Weekly: “The second edition of O’Connor’s delightful guide to good English offers a new chapter on e-mail etiquette that ought to make many people-even grammar snobs-feel a tad guilty: “E-mail,” she writes, “is no excuse for lousy English.” Let your audience determine your attention to tone and mechanics; use salutations and signatures; resist the urge to indiscriminately forward mail; and leave those emoticons and abbreviations at home, she says. Commonsense stuff-but every once in a while, it’s nice to be reminded. The rest of the volume is similar to the first: witty, economical and fun to read, it explains the secrets to grammar in refreshingly jargon-free sentences illustrated by numerous examples (“‘I assure you,’ said the grieving widow, ‘I ensured he was insured to the hilt’”). When is “majority” plural, and when singular? How does saying “Trixie loves spaghetti more than I?” mean something completely different than “Trixie loves spaghetti more than me?” While the volume is certainly handy to someone struggling with grammar basics-there are few style guides so breezy-the “Verbal Abuse” section will appeal to language experts and purists, especially those who decry the use of partner as a verb, or grow with a direct object (as in “grow the business”). As for those who like to use dialogue as a verb, “Don’t talk to them,” O’Connor says.”
We here at Mr. Grammar Rant couldn’t agree more.

So there we are – enough to keep us informed, entertained and perhaps a little frisky as the snow whips around the chimney and the dogs settle deeper into the couch cushions.

Happy reading, and have a great holiday!

The State of Things – So Far.

Now that the semester has come to an end for college and university students, it’s time once again to have a look at what we’ve learned. The following “state of things” report is collected from selected passages of student writings from the past few years containing errors that have resulted in, one hopes, unintended, and often humorous meanings.
So, for instance, on the world stage, there are questions to be asked: “Every day there is hunger and suffering in the world. Millions of people are dying. What’s really going on with the war? Where is Osama?” Where indeed. All we know is that he was “boring into a very large family,” and that the attacks on the Americans “were followed by the Osama Bin Laden decree to kill … any person who had ties and followed the Americans.” Clearly “We are not living up to the rules and guile lines.” Then again, “The need for a black and white world leaves no room for a medium.”
The war in Iraq has dominated the news, especially since “the region was taken over by Islamic surgeons,” after “The war was brought about by what the Muslims call G-Had.” They will “…continue in a violent manor until their goal is achieved,” although “Neither Hamas not Jihad clammed responsibility.” In the end, “Terrorism is not a reason to rage war on terror,” although it “is a problem and is running ramped through the world!” It’s important to note, however, that “Terrorism has gone through changes under many people, one of the largest being Vladimir Illich Lenin.” Hitler, on the other hand “started small, as any other person in the world.” But clearly, “When planes start crashing into buildings, something is obviously wrong.” Remember, though, that “They were not all westerners in that building, out to oppress the world, some were just janitors.”
Closer to home, “The house fire embellished most of the appliances and furniture,” but happily, “Within minutes of the accident, the fire station arrived!” Sadly though, “Obese children are on the rise,” and in the second to last election, “Prime Minister Cretien behaved with extinction.” Bullying continues to be a problem in our schools, and the “Consequences for students who bully will be one day suspension or explosion.” So behave, is clearly the message. Not all politicians understand the importance of behaving well, as a few got into hot water because “There was a problem with a minor miss communication.”
Also, “Today’s society dictates that a beautiful woman is one who is 110 pounds tall…” and “Martha Stewart has broken out into a line of bed linens.” Poor woman – as though things weren’t bad enough. Remember how her trial “…brought Martha Stewart a deformation of character”? On her show, “She watched members of the audience multiply,” perhaps in an effort to increase the number of people watching.
In sports, “The parent was upset about an elbow his son received from another player in a game,” suggesting that some athletes are clearly generous to a fault. Still, “It’s up to high ranking officials to drop the axe on violence in sports.” Perhaps if they weren’t high, they’d come up with a better metaphor. But because the player is a local favourite, “…the Free Press will give him a good clipping in the paper,” which will, almost certainly, do little to reduce the violence.
The real question for our nation is: “In order for our country to advance we need everyone to advance. But how can we when so many are behind?” Whatever the reason for our troubles, there are many who think that “Most of the trouble originated in the Untied States of America because “Canada has had relations with the US for decades…”
Solutions are being sought everywhere, except perhaps, among the “intellectually combatable who tend to coagulate.” The trick this past year was is to maintain an optimistic outlook when listening to politicians, and note that “The speaker used a good mix of self-defecating humour” while the speech was “defiantly full of fact and opinion.” Remember: “If we on this plant don’t work together…” we will continue to be in trouble.
What has been the role of the media in all this? We’ve discovered, for instance, that “Newspapers run just as businesses do: with the bottom line on the table,” which sounds terribly uncomfortable, and may explain all the grumpy editors. The media also “… absorbs people twenty-four hours a day,” and “…has shown a hunger for drowning celebrities in the public eye…” Very small celebrities, one assumes.
Unfortunately, “The news, and the journalists who write it, can’t help but become slanted.” As a result we find that “The words spilled over the page like a bowl of alphabet soup. This makes the reading a little sloppier than it needs to be.” Truer words were never spoken. Keep in mind that “When your life is affected because you are fallowed by reporters, you will change.” Well, who wouldn’t?
All of this can only leave us to ask: “Are we no mare than this?” and most importantly: “Terrorism: Will there never be peas??”
“Have a great weak end!”
The ned.

Of fit fiddles and the brass balls on frozen monkeys

Enthusiastic English language fan Mike, from near London, Ontario, has contacted us to ask the question: “Why do people say they are ‘fit as a fiddle’? Fiddles are neither fit nor unfit, are they – I mean, it’s not like they work our or anything? And what about ‘cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey,’ what’s that all about??”

Whoa there big fella – only one question to a customer. Although, in this case your questions are interesting enough to deserve a generous response. So… Let’s start with “fit as a fiddle.” When the term was coined – probably around the mid-1500s – in England, “fit” meant “suitable” or “appropriate,” in the way we might now say “She is well suited for the job,” or indeed, “She is fit for the job.” So in that sense “fit as a fiddle” means “as suitable to the purpose as a fiddle is suited for playing.” So “She is as well suited for the job as a fiddle is for playing,” would be a correct use of the old adage.

 As for the frozen brass balls on the poor monkeys, the expression in no way means what it sounds like, and is a lovely example of what happens to expressions when the meaning of the words change over time. Depending on which authority to check – and why not stick with Mr. Grammar Rant while you’re here anyway? – the reference may be to the brass plates, called “monkeys,” used to store cannon balls at shore batteries during the era of sail – during much of the British Empire, in other words. These plates has a small lip around the edges that held the cannon balls in place in a small pyramidal shape. The story is that when the weather turned brutally cold these brass monkeys would shrink enough that, on occasion, the balls would tumble off. Hence the expression: cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey.

An interesting footnote is that in equally brutally hot weather, people would comment that it was “hot enough to melt the tail off a brass monkey,” the “monkey” in this reference being to a kind of brass cannon – “gun” actually – on board ship that had a handle – or tail – used to aim the gun. But that’s a different kettle of fish…

Hope that helps, Mike, and thank you for the question.

Next up, naughty punctuation…

Sorting out it’s and its – once and for all.

Hi,
Today we dip into the mail bag to answer a letter. This one is from Catherine in London, Ontario, who would like people, especially those writing for a certain conservative newspaper in Toronto, to stop confusing “its” and it’s.”

Happy to oblige, Catherine.

Its and it’s are not the same thing. “It’s” is a contraction for “it is” and “its” is a possessive form of the pronoun “it” meaning “belonging to it.” It’s later than you think means it is later than you think.
A simple way to remember this rule is the fact that you don’t use an apostrophe for the possessive pronouns “his” or “hers,” so don’t do it with “its” either.
The confusion between “it’s” and “its” occurs because on almost every other word in the English language an apostrophe followed by the letter s – “’s” -indicates possession, as in boy, this grammar problem is a real dog’s breakfast. so English speakers naturally want to use it’s to mean “something belonging to it.”
But it’s is only used when it’s a contraction of it is or it has.

It has (it’s) been my pleasure to sort this one out.

Please write again.

Mr. Grammar Rant talks about “Affect” and Effect”

Hello, welcome to the Grammar Rant show. We have Debbie from Parry Sound on the line; please go ahead.

Yes, hello Mr. Grammar Rant. I saw your objection to the word “impact” in your excellent grammar book  “Write  Your Wrongs” published by Thomson/Nelson. Could you please explain your objection to the word? 

Of course, Debbie, and thank you, by the way, for that completely unsolicited plug for my book. 

I should start, however, by pointing out that my objection is not to the work “impact” per se, but to the use of the word when either “affect” or “effect” would be the more accurate words to use, as in , for example: The impact of the economic downturn was severe, which should more correctly be: “The effect of the economic downturn was severe.”

The solution is actually pretty straightforward. The majority of the time we can use affect as a verb and effect as a noun. 

Affect

To affect means “to influence,” as in, “The economic downturn affected workers,” or “The heat affected Debbie’s mood.” Affect can also mean to be pretentious, or act as if one were be superior in some way, as in, “She affected a snobby air of superiority.”

Effect 

Effect has a number of rather subtle meanings as a noun, but “a result” is pretty much part of the definitions. For example, “The effect – or the result – of the economic downturn has been job losses” or “ or “The humidity did not have an effect – or no result – on how Debbie felt.”  

Does that answer your question, Debbie? 

Oh yes, thank you Mr. Grammar Rant. I will never use the vague “impact” again when I really mean “affect” or “effect.”

Thank you to all our callers. Please tune in again next week when we once again answer your grammar questions.

Good night. Have a great weekend!

Can’t the subject and verb just get along?

Subject-verb agreement

          This syntax issue can really bedevil writers, especially students who are still struggling a little with the myriad of rules and regs. Perhaps part of the problem with this guideline is the word “agreement.” We all know the meaning of “agree” as in “You and I will never agree,” or “We will agree to disagree,” but when we talk about subject-verb agreement, we’re actually talking about something entirely different. In this case “agree” means matching subjects and verbs according to number. That is, when you have a singular subject, you have to match it with a singular verb: The dog runs. When you have a plural subject, you must have a plural verb form: The dogs run.

In short sentences we can hear the problem: The dogs runs just doesn’t sound right so we can usually make the necessary changes to The dogs run.

There are, however, three problems that can crop up:

• Prepositional phrases
• Indefinite pronouns
• Reversed sentence order

 Prepositional phrases consist of words that slip in between the subject and the verb. The dogs in the mudroom is dirty. The noun “mudroom” may be singular making us think, perhaps, that the following verb “is” should be singular as well. But the subject is “dogs.” Take out the prepositional phrase in the mudroom and we’re left with the sentence The dogs is dirty, which is clearly not correct. The correct verb should be “are” as in “The dogs in the mudroom are dirty.”

We only need to remember one thing about indefinite pronouns: if a word has one of these endings: everybody, everyone, anyone, anything, etc., it is singular. We can also include each, either, and neither in this group.

• Everyone is going…
• Each is taking the train…
• If anyone comes later…

The normal pattern for English sentence order is subject-verb. There are, however, a few cases where this order is reversed. For instance:

          There are dogs in the kitchen.  The standard order would be Dogs are there in the kitchen. Or some such version that places the subject and verb in the standard order.

          Where are they? Or:  They are where?

          We would not write or say There is dogs in the kitchen, or They is where?

          Easy this is, yes?

          Thank you Yoda, but not always.

 

 

 

The English Language Rant: Part Deux

“If those who have studied the art of writing are in accord on any one point, it is on this: the surest way to arouse and hold the attention of the reader is by being specific, definite, and concrete.” – Strunk and White: The Elements of Style

 Last time we had a look at the state of the English language, and what many think of as its deterioration in the hands – or perhaps more correctly – in the mouths, of modern users as the language evolves in what seems to be uncontrollable patterns. This week we consider how we might shape some of those patterns. Following the influence of the women’s movement in the 1970s and 1980s, and aided by the work of many multicultural groups, society has become more aware of, and sensitive to, language that might be offensive to members of various identifiable groups.

There is no question that the language journalists use shape the thoughts of their audiences, and by inference, shape the thoughts of society. The English language has always been dominated by the use of the male pronoun, for instance, with the result that for decades it was almost automatic to think of people in positions of power and authority, and those working in the professions, as male. In addition, there have been distinct differences in the way women and men are described in the media. We might, for instance, see something like: “The communications consultant, a petite, blonde in her early twenties, arrived at the meeting…” Well, unless the facts that the communications consultant is a petite, blonde female are somehow central to the information being shared, they have no business being included in the story. It’s difficult, if not impossible, to find a comparable descriptor saying: “The communications consultant, a balding, middle-aged white male, arrived at the meeting…” Both descriptors are unnecessary, and both impart a sex-role stereotype to the minds of the readers. It would be a special circumstance indeed that could warrant the inclusion of the age, sex, racial background and overall appearance of a person in a piece of journalism.

Writers – and speakers – must make special efforts to be sensitive to the language they use in order to avoid alienating members of their audience, and to avoid raising stereotypes and triggering bias in the readers. The problem of how to avoid the generalized male pronoun – the so-called pseudo-generic pronoun – is a thorny one. “A new student at college must be aware that he is responsible for his own success” implies that college students are male. Some writers have suggested mixing up the pronouns to indicate equality: “A new student at college must be aware that she is responsible for his own success,” but that’s just nonsense and confuses the reader. Other writers have suggested combining the pronouns: “A new student at college must be aware that s/he is responsible for his/her own success.” While that does work, and may possibly catch on in time, it’s still too awkward and clumsy. The best of bad solutions is probably to simply pluralize the pronouns: “New students at college must be aware that they are responsible for their own success.” This works pretty well in almost all cases, and does not “readjust” the facts.

One of my favourite “fuzzy” words that is much used in everyday language, yet has no really clear meaning, is the word “man-made.” If something is “man-made,’ is it hand-made? Machine-made? Simulated? Artificial? Made by men only? The temptation might be to say “all of the above,” but clearly something can’t be both hand-made and machine-made. I would suggest it is clearer and more accurate to say what the item is. If a machine made it, it is machine-made, if a person made it by hand, it is hand-made, if it is made out of synthetic fibres, it’s synthetic, and so on. To think of all this bias-free, gender-neutral language as political correctness gone mad would be to miss the point.

Language really does shape and influence the way we think of others and of ourselves. Since we need everybody to be involved in our society in order to make it work, we need to make sure everybody is included in the language, and we need to make sure we don’t belittle anybody and make them feel less than they are. Look at the way people who disagree with one other use language to help make their case: For people who support abortions, it’s a matter of “choice.” For people who don’t, abortion is “murder.” One scientist’s unborn baby is “foetal tissue,” while to those who oppose the use of foetal tissue for scientific research, it is an “unborn baby.” Words clearly shape how we think of ourselves, how we establish relationships with others, and our place in society.

Language that is accurate, inclusive and bias-free will go a long way towards breaking down barriers in communication. And let’s put a quick stop to those who object to the use of bias-free, gender-neutral language because it “changes the English language” by reminding them that one of the things that makes English such a delightful language is precisely the fact that it is in a constant state of change and adaptation. The English we use now is idiomatically very different from the language our parents and grandparents used, and heaven knows it’s being changed yet again by our own children. People and the language they used cannot be judged out of their time – that would be an anachronistic fallacy. What we can do, however, is look at their language, and then look at our own, and see if we are any better at getting the communication across clearly.

There will be some profanity

English is a fascinating and complex language which, to those who speak it as their first language, seems fairly straightforward and uncomplicated. To those who have to learn it as a second language, however, it’s a bewildering morass of double meanings, hidden allusions and words and expressions from other languages. The rules of spelling are hopelessly complex and contradictory, and the grammatical structure of English seems to have been created by someone who didn’t like people much.
Depending on to what source you refer, there are about a million words in the English language. Maybe about half of those are words specific to the various professions in science, the law, and the arcane world of technology. That still leaves us some 500,000 words from which to build our vocabulary.  Again, depending on sources, it’s estimated that an average five-year-old might know some 5000 words, and someone with a basic university education might have access to a mental lexicon of about 20,000. You can more than double that figure if you are a voracious reader, and triple it if you teach at the university level. Let’s not talk about what watching television will do to someone’s ability to express themselves clearly – it’s too depressing.
What matters in all this, of course, is how you string together whatever words you know in order to make yourself understood. It’s usually at this point that that people will sigh in exasperation and start to mutter darkly about the younger generation’s frightful abuse of the Queen’s English. References to the fall of Rome usually follow. But what has enabled English to not only survive but to thrive since a fairly recognizable version of the language was finally cobbled together out of Celtic, Latin, Scandinavian dialects, French and other languages into what scholars think of as the Later Middle English period around 1500, has been its ability to adopt and adapt.
Unlike the French who have The foundation of the Académie française (French Academy) which was created in 1634 by Cardinal Richelieu as an official organization whose goal was the purification and preservation of the French language, the English have allowed their language to evolve willy-nilly (which, incidentally, is an expression that dates to about 1608, and is a contraction of will he, nill he, or will ye, nill ye, meaning with or without the will of the person concerned). The Académie française still exists, by the way, and looks after the policing of the language and the adaptation of foreign words and expressions. There’ll be no donne moi un hot dog in Paris, but in London it is de rigeur to include French words and expressions in everyday language, as indeed it’s all right to toss in a little ad hoc Latin just to impress.
But what about profanities? And all those other awful words and expressions use by rap musicians and rock and roll singers? And what about the incursions of spellings employed by kids who use their cell phones to text one another? Surely none of that should be allowed into the Queen’s English, otherwise we’ll all be writing “OmGd C u l8r,” and clearly that won’t do.
Well, like it or not, English is a very democratic language, and as in any working democracy (from Greek demokratia, from demos meaning common people, and kratos” meaning rule or strength), the majority rules. In other words, once enough people use a word that it can be considered as being in the common parlance, it enters the standard lexicon.
For many people who care about these things, one of the most standard of standard lexicons is the venerable Oxford English Dictionary (OED). In 1992 Canada got its own Canadian Oxford Dictionary, and the lexicographers who work on these tomes are the ultimate arbiters of what constitutes “proper English”, remembering always that they draw their information from the words in common use.
So, for better or worse, the OED includes “hassle” and “dweeb” (“A person who is boringly conventional, puny or studious,” and yes, I’ll take that as a compliment), and any number of other words many people who worry about the state of the language would consider too colloquial to be appropriate.
The OED also includes – brace yourselves – the word “f*ck” which to anyone over the age of, say, forty, is a profanity of such magnitude that it can’t be included in even informal conversations, but which to younger people is, as the OED describes it, merely “… a meaningless intensifier.” And by the way, the OED, which includes etymologies in its definitions, says nothing about “Filed Under Carnal Knowledge” or anything like that. It refers to the word as coarse slang of unknown origin. So there.
The fact remains that fxck, which I, being much older than forty, can barely make myself type out, and which the prudish hosts of my blog won’t let me use, has become so pervasive in the parlance of young people as to all but completely remove its original, coarse, meaning. The ubiquity of the word is even earning it a dialect descriptor of its own as “f*ck patois” (from Fr. Patois meaning “native or local speech,” and may have referred to a clumsy manner of speaking). The word still has some power to shock, but once that power is lost, it may fall out of fashion as have so many slang words, only to make way for something even more egregious – perhaps even something that will shock the linguistic sensibilities of today’s younger generation.
What those who care about the state of the English language are faced with is a choice between trying to rein it in, which would be like trying to rein in the Internet, and letting the language evolve as it will, even if that means losing much loved words and expressions to the vagaries of fashion. But after all, nobody speaks like Shakespeare anymore. Does that make English any less vibrant or useful? Methinks not.

Comma get it!

Commas can give us a great deal of trouble, perhaps because someone once told us to just put them in when we want to take a pause while writing. That, unfortunately, is not usually enough of a guideline for when to use commas, so here is short list of suggested rules (please send your leftover commas to the semi-colon bin…):

• Commas separate independent clauses when they are joined by any of the coordinating conjunctions: for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so. (FANBOYS.) I picked up my pen, and I stared at the page. 
• Use a pair of commas in the middle of a sentence to set off parenthetical phrases and words that are not essential to the meaning of the sentence. Use one comma to indicate the beginning of the pause and one at the end to indicate the pause: I saw the house, with a nice lawn, from the train. (Hint: to spot the parenthetical phrases, proofread for mechanics rather than meaning.)
• Commas separate three or more words, phrases, or clauses written in a series. The reporter wrote about taxes, the environment, crime and unemployment. (Yes, I know many would argue there should be a comma after “crime,” and they would be right, except for when the rule applies to journalistic writing when the final comma is left out – I have no idea why that is, but there are bonus points to anyone who can tell us.)
• Commas separate two or more adjectives that describe the same noun. He was a tall, dark stranger. Don’t add an extra comma between the final adjective and the noun.
• Use a comma to shift between the main text and a quotation. The student said she liked the school because, “We have lots of opportunities to be creative,” adding that, “I would hate to transfer.”

The rules governing comma use are, as someone once said, a bit bendy, but they can go a long way toward making writing clearer.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGl1j-SV5QA
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