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Punctuation marks are symbols used to mark the end of phrases or sentences, such as commas, semicolons and periods. Other punctuation marks that may not be as commonly recognized include apostrophes and angle brackets; though not commonly employed when writing Advanced Placement essays. It’s wise to familiarize oneself with them.
1. It is generally inappropriate to use an ampersand (&) to represent “and” in body copy, headlines, pull quotes or titles of programs and events. Exceptions include B&B, R&D and Q&A which have become accepted abbreviations forms.
2. It is common practice to use quotation marks when directly quoting from another source, or to distinguish certain words from the rest of a text. They are also helpful in accentuating speech that occurs out loud.
3. Question and exclamation marks should usually not be used in formal writing, with one exception – when using such markers would help clarify an idea or emphasize something important.
4.
A semicolon should usually serve to separate two independent clauses when joining main clauses when commas may cause confusion or misinterpretation – particularly important when joined over long sentences. Furthermore, semicolons are helpful when joining two clauses with conjunctive adverbs such as nonetheless, moreover, additionally or consequently which require further explanation; such as when James left his desk messy so Sarah had to clean it up after him.
5.
It is generally wise to avoid using an ellipsis in formal writing; however, in certain circumstances it can be useful in eliminating unnecessary words from sentences. For instance, when shortening long ones to make them shorter using the ellipsis may show where words need to be cut from it or can note breaks between quotes/names (for instance: “I remember Bob Ross saying happy little trees are going to grow”). An alternative would be an asterisk (*), although this should only be used when absolutely necessary in context (for instance when writing formal letters). Use an ellipsis only when its context makes sense in context (for instance when writing formal letters).
