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I was sent this today, "Get a previously published Sci-Fi author to write an original story (140 words max) about Misha, the Queen of England and an Elopus." As a previously published Sci-Fi author, I said I would do my best and then took a nap. Had an idea, came downstairs to look at the fine print, and realized I was unsure about what the person asked for. Is Misha supposed to be the Queen of England and an Elopus, or am I supposed to write about three things (Misha, the Queen of England, and an Elopus). See? Oxford commas matter.
Posts: 823 | Registered: May 2009
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Matter those Oxford commas might, but they'd actually introduce another, *different* ambiguity.
Suppose the writer always uses Oxford commas. He writes "Misha, the Queen of England, and an Elopus." Seems a clear list of three people right? Wrong. The writer *could* mean "Misha, who is the Queen of England, and also an Elopus, who is a different person altogether." If we know the writer always uses Oxford commas, then the phrase "Misha, the Queen of England and an Elopus," is unambiguous: it refers to a single person.
The problem is that the comma is used to both separate items in a list of three or more AND to set off an appositive phrase. Take this from a computer science major who has written language parsers: there is simply no way to fix this by *standardizing* the use of the comma; one way or the other the standard will introduce ambiguities.
What we really need is a different punctuation mark for apposition. The only one in current use is the em-dash. An em-dash is longer than a hyphen, and is often represented in plain text by two hyphens. This makes the phrase perfectly clear.
"Misha -- the Queen of England and an Elopus": there is only one person referred to.
"Misha -- the Queen of England -- and an Elopus": there are two persons referred to.
"Misha, the Queen of England, and an Elopus": there are three persons referred to.
Unfortunately em-dash to set off an appositive isn't standard, although everyone understands it. Because everyone understands it, it should become standard.
Posts: 1459 | Registered: Dec 2010
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A serial list punctuated without a Harvard comma, Oxford comma for British dialects, signals to me immediately and unequivocally a composer is influenced by journalism style. In this case, a periodical publication call for submissions (short fiction publication), patently a periodical publication influence, journalism not prose style per se, this absent comma is a habit of those influences.
Discretionary descriptive use or nondiscretionary prescriptve use is a question of substance for whether to use a journalism or prose serial list punctuation style. For journalism style, the convention is publication space conservation at the expense of clarity. For prose publication style, the convention is clarity at the expense of publication space consumed.
Other examples of journalism style's space conservation include leaving out commas following a sentence adverb or prefatory adverb phrase. For example, prose style: Actually, the Harvard comma or Oxford comma are shorthand terms for serial list punctuation. Journalism leaves out the comma following "Actually." Or adverb phrase: Quite ever so frankly[,] a natural dialect is one's native language one.
A principle from journalism's space conservation style emphasis crosses over into prose. Known as downstyle, several punctuation mark principles of Standard Written English have become optional for prose style in the past few decades: abbreviation punctuation and word or hyphen compounding, for examples. F.B.I., or any three letter term abbreviation, omits the periods for well-known acronyms. Written-out numbers used to be hyphenated, Nineteen-eighty-four. Now hyphens only go between whole numbers, as spoken, from twenty-one to ninety-nine, and fractions: three-quarters, one-eighth, ever mindful that vernacular uses, like radio ten codes hyphenate: ten-twenty, for example. Prescriptively, prose spells out all numerals; however, downstyle during the past century has left time, date, and measurement numerals in their number form: 1984, 12:30 a.m., 6 inches, though an hour and a half. Numerous terms during the past fifty years have transformed from separate words to hyphenated to one word: gun powder to gunpowder, co-operate to cooperate, any more (adv) to anymore. Any more (adj) remains two words.
Prose style clearly expects a serial comma before a final list item. Yet many publisher's house styles either favor a journalism downstyle style or pay no attention, only that the serial list punctuation style is consistent. A majority of prose publishers, book or periodical, though, insist upon a serial comma style of the A, B, and C variety, or another coordination conjunction term substituted for "and:" or, nor, but.
Several recent prose style manuals favor the journalism serial punctuation style; however, due to possible confusion, the conventional prose publication principle is to separate serial list items with commas and, certainly, one before a conjunction term preceding a final serial list item.
Other prose serial list scenarios, for examples:
A and B, C, D, and E. A, B, C, and D and E, A, B, C, D. A: B, C, D. A; B, C, D.
Posts: 6037 | Registered: Jun 2008
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MattLeo raises an important point about appositive phrases and other parenthetical clauses and phrases versus serial lists. This line "about Misha, the Queen of England and an Elopus. Context for clarity's sake is missing, that neither prose or journalism style serial punctuation itself clears up. A colon prescriptively precedes a serial list given as an appositive: this, that, and the other. An em dash will serve as well //about--this, that, and the other.
An additional coordination conunction also would serve: Misha and the Queen of England and an Elopus. Or plus substituted for "and." Or another coordination phrase: Misha and, further, the Queen of England, as well as an Elopus.
Many possibilities; though the unsophisticated nature of the submission prompt leaves me by default to conclude the prompt is for three antagonal subjects. So what's an Elopus? I believe that's the motif of consequence for which the prompt asks for focus.
I might riff on the journalism serial list style: The Queen of England confronts rival Misha with an Elopus, say a daring suitor-fantasy creature driving for the hoop of an elopement. Misha bride run off, eloped from the Queen by using an elopus. Greek suffix -us for a masculine genetive marker.
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