English Punctuation!

You probably use simple punctuation, such as full stops, commas and question marks, on a daily basis, both when writing and when speaking. However, here is some sophisticated punctuation that, if used in your writing, makes it very professional and of a high standard.

Name	Form	Purpose	Example
Colon	:	used before starting a list	The meal was good: they ate salad, roast chicken, cake and fruit.
Semicolon	;	separates the items in a list of longer clauses	I have been to Newcastle, Carlisle and York in the North; Bristol, London and Portsmouth in the South; and Cromer, Norwich and Lincoln in the East.
Exclamation mark	!	used to express surprise, horror or an amplified feeling	Please don’t hurt me!
Brackets	()	can add extra information	George Washington (the first president of the United States) gave his farewell address in 1796.
Slash	/	indicates an alternative	Actress/model Elizabeth Hurley was at the awards show.
Ellipsis	…	indicate the passing of time	Many years passed… still she remained ill.

We hope this was useful and that you are able to use some of these forms of punctuation in your writing. We’d love to hear from you, so leave us a comment to tell us whether you found this useful. You can even show us an example of your punctuation practice! 

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