The Story of Punctuation

 Punctuation: the beginning

Over the time I have been writing my blogs, my idea has been to show that punctuation is an integral part of the English language. Along with spelling and grammar, punctuation is part of a language that is changing and evolving. It had a beginning, it has evolved from that beginning and continues to evolve to who knows where in the future.

I talked about where it came from and why it was needed, how it evolved, where it will go and where it has been.

I have written a little about the correct usage of some items and how it has become an obsession for some people. I have tried to have a little fun with punctuation.

What is it good for?

Punctuation (from the Latin punctus for point or pricking) is the use of a series of symbols to help in the understanding of English both written and aural. The word is from the same Latin root as punctilious meaning attentative to etiquette, and punctual meaning on time. [1]

Punctuation marks are a guide to when to pause (the full stop or period), when to give a pause (the colon) when to give a shorter pause (the semi-colon) and the shortest pause (the comma). It also advises when to add an inflection (exclamation mark or question mark), and much more.

Punctuation can add lilt and music to reading a piece out loud. It clarifies the meaning rather than leaving it slightly ambiguous. 

The origins of punctuation


According to the New World Encyclopaedia [1] and Wikipedia [2] the oldest use of punctuation was on a stone tablet called "Mesha Stele." or "Moabit stone."

It was written circa 850 BCE by King Mesha of Moab (now part of Jordan) and is notable for employing points between the words and horizontal strokes between the sense section as punctuation.

  

The introduction of the first standard system of punctuation is attributed to Aldo Manuzio.

He is credited with popularizing the practice of ending sentences with the colon or full stop and also for inventing Italic type.


Punctuation then took a big step with the introduction of movable type in the 15^th century.
Johannes Gutenberg invented his printing press with movable type around 1540. 

He is also credited with inventing the hyphen. If a word was not completed at the end of a line he included a hyphen to indicate it was unfinished and contin-
ued it on the next line. 

Punctuation evolved even more quickly from there. Well relatively quickly. Over the next 400 years new punctuation marks were devised for various reasons until...

‘By the 19th century, punctuation in the western world had evolved "to classify the marks hierarchically, in terms of weight” [3]

The use of punctuation was not standardised until after the invention of printing. According to the 1885 edition of The American Printer, the importance of punctuation was noted in various sayings by children such as:

 Charles the First walked and talked half an hour after his head was cut off.

With a semi-colon and a comma added it reads:

Charles the First walked and talked; half an hour after, his head was cut off.  

Punctuation then seemed to get complicated. Rules evolved, writers argued, experts wrote style guides. One style guide had seventeen rules for the use of the apostrophe. 

People still get up in arms about incorrect usage of punctuation especially the apostrophe.

Believe it or not there is even an Apostrophe Protection Society which has its own website with photos of sign writers errors. It’s a lot of fun and worth a look. http://www.apostrophe.org.uk/


Some Tricky ones

Brackets or parantheses ( ) [ ] { }

The intention of the bracket is to include additional information within a sentence. The sentenceshould make sence with or without the information inside the brackets.

For example. I went to an exhibition (by Henry Maas) on Sunday at the Collingwood Gallery. 
Delete the information inside the brackets and the sentence still stands. 

If an editor wants to add the additional information, he (or she) would have used square brackets indicating it was inserted by someone other than the writer. So it would be:

I went to an exhibition [by Henry Maas] on Sunday at the Collingwood Gallery. 

Different types of brackets can be used together in one sentence (if you want to include an aside [or a date] or superfluous information) as required.


The apostrophe

The apostrophe is probably the most misunderstood of all the punctuation family. Poor ‘poste doesn’t know where to stand. He gets pushed back and forth like the runt of the litter.
     Stand here in front of the s.
     No no, back here after the s.
Back and forth, up and down. Poor little fellow doesn’t know if he is an apostrophe, a comma or a quote mark half the time.


The Apostrophe Protection Society has tried to simplify things for him and his users. It has written the three basic rules for its use on their website  

      1. Apostrophises are used to denote a missing letter or letters,

       for example:

I can't    for  I cannot.
It's         for  it is.
I don't   for   I do not.

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)

3. Apostrophes are never ever used to denote plurals!

       Common examples of such abuse (all seen in real life!) are: 

Banana’s for sale.

1000’s of bargains.

Menu’s printed to order.

This video is dedicated to Lynn Truss who wrote the book "Eats, Shoots and Leaves" [7]







Bad Punctuation Joke.


An apostrophe walkes into a bar.
The barman says ‘I think you’re in the wrong place’ 



The future of punctuation 

Earlier this year researchers asked the question 'are children losing the capacity to read and write? [4]

The answer they came up with after their research is probably not.

It is believed that having fun with texting is creative and 'leads to creativity and intuition in crosswords, poetry and so on'.

Masla and Tarica quote Britain's poet laureate, Carol Ann Duffy ( who 'believes texting is the ideal springboard to poetry writing') and psychologist Dr. Nenagh Kemp who states that 'language is liquid and flourishing.' and 'it makes sense that someone who is good at language, is also good at crosswords, poetry, etc.'

Young people do understand that while they can have fun and be creative with texts and emails, it is not acceptable in essays etc. They understand that they cannot and they do not use incorrect spelling, grammar or punctuation in formal letter writing or schoolwork.

The fucha is probly safe in their hands -:) 

Some of the emoticons, abbreviations and shorthand will probably find their way into the language in the near future. And why shouldn’t they! On with the evolution! 

Fun with punctuation

In 1999, a journalist for the Washington Post Bob Hirshfield, who was heartily sick of poor spelling and grammar, wrote an article about a new computer virus called the Strunkenwhite Virus. [5]

Hirshfield took the name for his virus from a book called 'The Elements of Style' by William Strunk Jr. and E.B. White.

This virus (according to Hirshfield) was 'more dangerous than the Chernobyl threat'. Apparently the virus refused to deliver emails with grammatical errors. If such emails were found it would shut down the computer that sent the email and take hours to restart.

He quoted an FBI agent who (via the telephone because he was too scared to use his computer email system) stated this insidious virus was 'a threat to freedom and Western Society, blah, blah, blah.'

Summation

Writing has been with us for less than 3000 years. Originally only a select few had access writing and the ability to read. The increase of education, the printing press, newspapers, computers and the internet have speeded up the use of language and with it punctuation. Today there are languages within languages. Geologists, Chemists, Librarians, Physicists, Big bang Theorists and Engineers, while they al have a common language in English, they also have their own words and phrases idiosyncratic to their professions. With these words and phrases, by necessity come punctuation marks. New languages require new punctuation.

The artists and writers of the world also develop new language and with it new punctuation.
Some writers avoid punctuation. Gertrude Stein hated the comma and William Burroughs had his own punctuation.
Others like E.E. Cummings used it like it was colour in a painting [6]

                                                ' while in the battered
                                                  bodies the odd unlovely
                                                  souls struggle    slowly   and    writhe
                                                  like caught.  brave:  flies;                    '

Why should we imagine that the current signs used as punctuation or the current rules of usage should stand in stone. Punctuation is a part of Language. Language evolves.

Bibliography

[1]Mesha Stele n.d. New World Encyclopaedia. viewed 7 Oct 2011, <http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Mesha_Stele?oldid=836298>

[2] Mesha Stele n.d. Wikipedia viewed 7 Oct. 2011,<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mesha_Stele>

[3]Punctuation n.d. Wikipedia viewed 7 Oct 2011,<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Punctuation>

[4] Maslen, G. Tarica, G 2011, 'Textese g8 training 4 poets of 2 moro' The Age 12 Sept, p. 16

[5]   The Pluperfect Virus n.d.bobsfridge viewed 22 October 2011,< http://www.bobsfridge.com/virus.html>

[6] Reviews of selected poetry collections  n.d. Modern American Poetry, viewed 23 October 2011,<http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/poets/a_f/cummings/reviews.htm>


[7] Truss, L. 2009, Eats, Shoots and Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation, Fourth Estate, Hammersmith, UK.