Conference thebay::joyoflex

    There's a diminishing use of commas which I think is the result of
    people not being so thoroughly educated, and therefore not knowing how
    to use them.
    
    An alternative view is that now there's so much to read the last thing
    you need is commas to break up the flow of data.
    
    Nick - a cynic fom the UK

    Actually, Joska, it looks as if you you commas quite adeptly.  Your
    sentence, far from being confusing, is an excellent example of how
    to separate components in a list.
    
    					andrew

    On a more serious note, here are some of the main uses for commas:
    
    1. To separate words, phrases, and clauses that are part of a series
    of three or more items.
    
       [My favorite fruits are apples, plums, and pears.]
    
    2. To separate independent clauses joined by the coordinating
    conjuctions and, but, yet, for, or, nor, so.
    
       [I would like to learn how to play the piano, but I don't have the
       time necessary to devote to it.]
    
    3. To separate a long introductory phrase or subordinate clause from
    the rest of the sentence.
    
       [Although I recognize that I need to be saving money now if I want a
       comfortable retirement, the temptation to buy goodies in the present
       is often too great.]
    
    4. To set off words of direct address, interjections, or transitional
    words used to introduce a sentence.
    
       [Incidentally, I'll be leaving early tomorrow.]
    
    5. To set off an introductory modifier.
    
       [Angrily, I stormed out of the room.]
    
    6. To set off a nonrestrictive clause or phrase.
    
       [Tennis, which is my favorite sport, is a wonderful way get
       exercise.]
    
    7. To set off appositives.
    
       [Jim, the foreman at the plant, is up for promotion.]
    
    8. To set off parenthetical words or phrases.
    
       [You realize, of course, that nothing you said has any relevance to
       the issue at hand.]
    
    There are various other details with dates, numbers, quotations, forms
    of address, etc. Hope this helps.
    
    	BD�

With regard to case 1, I, too, was taught:

	"My favorite fruits are apples, plums, and pears."

However, in recent years, I've more frequently seen the following cited as the
"correct" form:

	"My favorite fruits are apples, plums and pears."

Go figure.

\dave

    Re -1:
    
    Ah, I see!
    Thanks God, there are lots of common in our languages!
    (Someone, who was told to be an extremely good teacher, had missguided
    me in the very racent past telling me that English applies commas only
    to separate restrictive suborditate closes...)
    But there are differences also...
    
    1.) We apply commas prior to conjunctions "that" as well. I.e.  Barry's
    example #3 should be written according to Hungarian grammar as follows:
    "Although I recognize, that I need to be saving money, now ... "
                         ^                               ^
    2.) Maybe I don't realy understand #4 but I would not apply the comma
    there. BTW I would rather put the sentence as: I'll be incidentally
    leaving tomorrow". Admiting that my education is English is defective
    but my problem regarding #4 is that I don't know what "transitional
    word" and direct address" are. Maybe at home I'll be able to find
    something in my books on them.
    
    3.) My problem regarding #5 is the sequence again. I would have told "I
    stormed out of the room angrily".
    
    Maybe #4 and #5 intends to stress the first word and indicate the
    abnormal sequence of the words in the sentence?
    
    All my doubts/problems verify that:
    a.) learning a language means first of all trying to understand the way
    of thinking foreign people;
    b.) learning English fluently, supposing that you hadn't spent your
    childhood between English people, neither had been living for couple of
    years in the UK or US, is verging on impossible.
    
    Joska

    Sorry, Dave had overtook me, so "-1" in .4 referred to .2 Hi!
    Re .5: I would have bet that the second version is right. (Use commas
    after all items of the series except the one one but last where "and"
    should be used, just like Hungarian language does.)

    The "no last comma in a series" rule, even if followed, is not
    absolute. For example:
    
    	We have apples, pears, or peaches for dessert.
    and
    	We have apples, pears or peaches for dessert.
    
    are both "correct", because the final comma can be omitted without risk
    of ambiguity. However,
    
    	We have apples, pears, or peaches and cream for dessert.
    
    requires the second comma to avoid ambiguity. The net result is that
    including the final comma in a series is always correct. Omitting it is
    sometimes correct. I prefer to always include it. It's faster than
    carefully proofreading everything to see if the microsecond I saved by
    not including it gave the right result.
    
    Fowler (Modern English Usage) has pages on the usage of commas if you
    want the gory details.
    
    -Tom

    Re .7:
    
    Tom, I have a modest collection of grammar books dictionaries including
    a maybe W8CNB as well (isn't clearly stated but that a '76 edition) but
    aint't got a Fowler.
    A xerrox copy of the adequate pages were apprechiated.
    The necessity of a comma prior to "or" is obvious for me on the contrary
    with usage before an "and" unless you want to make difference that
    "fruit and cream" is not a single meal e.g. cream stuffed with fruit
    slices but two independent items.
    
    Joska
    
    Thanks a lot for the examples!

Here's a comment from a Hungarian Swiss of English mother tongue 
(szia, J�ska): the commas in a list are different in the UK.  The 
comma before the "and" is NOT allowed.  If there is an ambiguity, then
I agree it's required. 

G�bor.

    When I started working at Oxford University Press, I was told
    `you'll have to learn to use the Oxford comma'. I'd never met 
    the term, but found that it referred to the comma before a
    conjunction at the end of a list. I've never met any other
    house style that insisted on it.
    
    A tangentially related bee in my overcrowded bonnet is the need to
    repeat the conjunction in certain circumstances: `...breakfast of bacon
    and egg, toast and marmalade, and coffee' for example. Devotees of the
    No Comma Before a Conjunction cult...but that's a whole nother rathole.
    
    b

    You mean an Oxford comma doesn't have laces?
    
    ed

    
    re: .10
    
    >I've never met any other house style that insisted on it.
    
    Several of the (Digital) documentation groups I've work for over the
    years insisted on it, precisely because of potential for ambiguity.
    
    JP

    From Fowler ("stops", "COMMAS"):
    
    `The more usual way of punctuating such an enumeration as was used as
    an example in the preceding section is "French, German, Italian and
    Spanish": the commas between "French" and "German" and "German" and
    "Italian" take the place of "ands"; there is no comma after "Italian"
    because, with "and", it would be otiose. There are, however, some who
    favour putting one there, arguing that, since it may sometimes be
    needed to avoid ambiguity, it may as well be used always for the sake
    of uniformity. Examples of sentences calling for a comma before the
    "and" are: "Tenders were submitted by John Brown, Cammel Laird,
    Vickers, and Harland and Wolff." Without the comma after Vickers we do
    not know whether the tendering firms were four or five, or, if they
    were four, whether "Harland" partners "Vickers" or "Wolff". "The smooth
    grey of the beech stem, the silky texture of the birch, and the rugged
    pine." If there is no comma after "birch", the pine is given a silky
    texture. The use of a comma before the "and" is here recommended.'

    From http://c.gp.cs.cmu.edu:5103/prog/webster?otiose 
    
    Webster Definition for "otiose"
    
    Cross references: 1. vain 
    
    oti. ose \'o- -she--. o-s, ' o-t-e--\ \.o- -she--'a:s-* t-e-, .
    o-t-e--\ aj [L otiosus, fr. otium leisure] 1: being at leisure : IDLE
    2: STERILE, FUTILE 3: lacking use or effect : FUNCTIONLESS - oti.ose.ly av

    Re .13: The case is that in your example the commas separate not
    enlined words but coordinated closes. Due to this a comma prior to
    "and" is realy necessary, otherwise the description given in the
    proceeding coorditare cloose were merged to the preceeding.
    
    GyJ 

    re: .-1
    
    .13 is not my example. It's Fowler's - probably the most widely
    referenced English grammarian (worldwide) and also the original author,
    with his brother, of the Concise Oxford Dictionary. If there are any
    errors there, they'd be errors in my transcription.
                          
    -Tom

    Re .12
    
    �    >I've never met any other house style that insisted on it.
    
    I should have said `insisted on it in all cases'.
    
    b

    >I should have said `insisted on it in all cases'.
    
    Instead of in only the insistive case?

    I heard it said from a lawyer that while commas would make legal
    documents easier to read, they can impact the meanings in ways that
    were not originally intended.  SO ... they leave out punctuation,
    including periods (full stops) in places and rely on the judiciary to
    validate the intended meaning!
    
    No wonder lawyers write so much gobbledygook!
    
    Stuart

    ,er shurely the plural of comma is commata, like,, coming as it dus
    from Greek ,?

    re -2, I believe this is common practice in Great Britian. I
    have a contract from a British publisher of a book I once wrote, and
    the thing has no commas and, I think, no capitals. Looks very odd.
    U.S. contacts are not written this way, at least none that I have
    recently seen. I think it's a Brit practice.
    Bruce