ESL General English Grammar Questions

Re: Punctuation and the Colon

CalifJim — Mon, 26 Mar 2007 22:05:46 GMT

and for "it has"

Re: Punctuation and the Colon

Anonymous — Tue, 13 Dec 2005 11:02:00 GMT

the word "it's" stands for "it is"

Re: Punctuation and the Colon

anon1 — Mon, 27 Dec 2004 17:46:54 GMT

All,

taiwandave, I stand corrected. You are right, for I am sure I do use "it's" to represent "it has".

MM thank you for confirming that a complete phrase is required to the left of the colon. I wonder if there is some British English versus American English at play? Because this quote is taken from a book on punctuation, I would tend to think that editing process would be impecabble. Having written that, I do note that there are a lot of poor ratings on Amazon.com.

The quote is from page 43 of "Eats, Shoots & Leaves" by Lynne Truss. It is the best-seller's list, which is quite amazing for a punctuation or grammar book.

MountainHiker

Re: Punctuation and the Colon

taiwandave — Mon, 27 Dec 2004 14:10:16 GMT

Sorry -- MH it was.

Re: Punctuation and the Colon

Mister Micawber — Mon, 27 Dec 2004 14:04:34 GMT

I think you mean MH, Dave. I'm not sure whether he means say it or write it, though...

Re: Punctuation and the Colon

taiwandave — Mon, 27 Dec 2004 13:55:44 GMT

CalifJim,

It is actually quite common in speech to contract "it has" to "it's". You say that you don't do this, but I expect that you probably do. Examples:

It's been a long time coming.
Law and Order is a great show. It's been on TV for years.
It's been raining for days.

Re: Punctuation and the Colon

Mister Micawber — Mon, 27 Dec 2004 13:43:15 GMT

Not wrong, Paco. Your basic explanation is correct, except for 'phrase': it should be an independent clause to the left of the colon, although often the clause appears a bit incomplete without its explanation, definition, elucidation, or exemplification on the right.

The sentence in question is wrong (just) because of that: 'the rule is' has a subject and verb, but it does need a complement. That said, I am often guilty myself of similar formations, so I hope that this phrasal style is well on its way to legitimacy. The point is: I'd hate to get caught out.

Re: Punctuation and the Colon

CalifJim — Mon, 27 Dec 2004 08:31:02 GMT

Hi Guest! Maybe it's been a while since you spoke English?

Re: Punctuation and the Colon

paco2004 — Mon, 27 Dec 2004 08:26:33 GMT

Hello MountainHiker

I'm an English learner from Japan. Could you allow me to throw my two cents worth to your question?

I learned in my English class (really long long time ago) that you English speakers use semicolons (;) to connect two independent complete sentences. And colons (:) are used as an indicator to show items that additionally explain the preceding phrase, like the sentence you quoted. Do you think what I learned is wrong?

paco

Re: Punctuation and the Colon

anon1 — Mon, 27 Dec 2004 06:57:54 GMT

I tend to agree with you on both counts. But I think it is okay to use "it's" for "it has," though I would never do it.

MountainHiker

Re: Punctuation and the Colon

Guest — Mon, 27 Dec 2004 04:42:19 GMT

I think you're right. Also, I would never say "it's" meaning "it has."

Punctuation and the Colon

anon1 — Sun, 26 Dec 2004 22:18:48 GMT

Hi,

Is this following sentence grammatical:

The rule is: the word "it's" (with apostrophe) stands for "it is" or "it has".

I always believed that the stuff prior to the colon had to be complete sentence in its own right?

What say you?

MountainHiker