Before I started teaching copy-editing courses, I assumed that one of the nice things about being a teacher would be sharing hard-earned expertise with wide-eyed students awed by my vast knowledge.

There’s no denying that commas are helpful little flecks of punctuation. They allow us to separate written clauses and do good work when especially numerous or complicated groups of things exist in a ...

Here’s an interesting question posed to me recently: Which of the following sentences is punctuated correctly? Look for fresh basil at your local grocery store, and, if it isn’t available, tell the ...

Commas are, important and shouldn’t just be, thrown in, anywhere. Like some, people, apparently do. With some, writers it’s like they, have a bucket full of commas and they, feel compelled to, use ...

Do you go to the store for “cupcakes, vanilla, and chocolate” or “cupcakes, vanilla and chocolate”? There’s a long-running debate over whether it’s proper to include that last comma in a list. Well, ...

Before I started teaching copy-editing courses, I assumed that one of the nice things about being a teacher would be sharing hard-earned expertise with wide-eyed students awed by my vast knowledge.

Anyone who has written for the Brown Daily Herald has had to put up with the stain of barbarism that persists in its style guide. I am referring to the rule that prohibits the use of the Oxford comma, ...

Mid last week, I had just finished reading the sad story of Jean-Pierre Adams, a former footballer of international acclaim when I switched tabs on my office desktop computer to see what was new in my ...