2 Key Things Writers Need to Know About the Oxford Comma

The vaunted Oxford comma has been in the news lately. To wit:

• "Let's put a full stop to the Oxford comma." The Telegraph, July 2, 2011.
• "Grammar Enthusiasts Fear Losing the Oxford Comma." KMOV.com, St. Louis, July 1, 2011.
• "Oxford Comma, Still With Us." The Economist, June 30, 2011.

Never heard of the Oxford comma, you say? What's all this fuss about the Oxford comma?

The Oxford comma is the comma that follows the last item in a series, just before the "and," "or," or some other conjunction. You might know it by its more popular name, the serial comma. (See below.)

Writers and English teachers know all about the Oxford comma. The rest of us, not so much.

Keys 1, and 2

To my mind, writers and authors need to know just two things about the Oxford comma, and two things only.

1. The Oxford comma is helpful in managing lists. Most of the time we craft reasonably simple lists in which each item is independent and not tied conceptually to another item. Here are some examples:

• The patient c/o nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea.


• He grimaced, flexed his right leg, and pointed to his right lower quadrant


• The drug is contraindicated in anaphylaxis, severe combined immunodeficiency, coma, reduced level of consciousness, or pregnancy.

But suppose one of the items needs to be clearly tied to another item? That's when the Oxford comma really shines. Notice the difference in meaning between these two lists:

• The patient was visited by his wife, a co-worker and a friend.


• The patient was visited by his wife, a co-worker, and a friend.

In the first, the wife was apparently the only visitor. In the second three people showed up.

1. Conform to the publisher's style. Maybe you're a firm believer in the Oxford comma. Or maybe you would just as soon see it disappear forever. Whatever you think actually makes no difference when you're writing for publication. You need to know whether the publisher uses it, and if so, then you use it too.
   
   
   To find out what a particular publisher prefers, check a few of their books, journals, or magazines. Do you consistently see the Oxford comma? Then use it.
   
   If you don't see the comma used consistently, then assume you can either use it or ditch it, as you see fit.

My recommendation

Use it always. Makes life so much easier.

Now go forth and write, create, formulate, scribe, scribble, and publish!

Confusing Commas

On the list of most common grammatical errors, misused commas rank right up there with misspellings and Mrs. Batchelder's rank perfume and hissing s.

(Sorry about that, I got a bit carried away. Every time I think about an English class I flash back to crazy old Mrs. Batchelder's high school English classroom. Then I throw up.)

So let's tackle commas in a way I hope will make sense.

First up: Serial commas

I prefer serial commas because they help reduce confusion. Serial commas are commas used after the next to last item in a list. Here's an example:

The patient complained of nausea, vomiting, and headache.

The comma after "vomiting" is a serial comma. You don't have to use one, but I do think they can be helpful in certain situations. So when in doubt, use it.

Next: Introductory phrases

Commas after an introductory phrase are rapidly losing their grip on us, and thank goodness. These are examples of introductory phrases:

• After awhile


• On the other hand


• After the patient had gone to the bathroom

These phrases set up the rest of the sentence. Your English teacher probably smacked you upside the head if you didn't use a comma after an introductory phrase, but he had better not do that now unless you're writing for beginning readers. If you're writing for adults with a reading level over, say, the 10^th grade, you needn't worry about sticking a comma after a beginning-of-the-sentence phrase. Use them only if leaving them out makes the sentence confusing, as in:

You know it seems odd that the window was left open like that.

The writer probably meant the sentence this way:

You know, it seems odd that the window was left open like that.

That kind of situation demands a comma.

Separating "sentences"

This is probably the toughest one for people to remember: When do you use a comma when you have what we call a complex sentence?

Generally if you have two complete sentences on either side of an and, but, or, nor, or any other what you wanna call yer conjunctions, use a comma. For instance, if we put these two sentences together…

Mr. Robinson knocked over the lamp.

AND

I ran into the room to find out what happened…

We would use a comma, as in:

Mr. Robinson knocked over the lamp, and I ran into the room to find out what happened.

Here, though, you would NOT use a comma:

Mr. Robinson knocked over the lamp and yelled for help.

Why no comma? Because "yelled for help" isn't a complete sentence.

Okay, class, that's enough for today.