Serial Comma Use

[sierramcconnell]

Simple question: Which sentence is correct?

Red, Blue, and White.

Red, Blue and White.


I go with the first one because it was how I was raised, and because it's what I'm used to by all the grammatical rules I've ever been taught. But this ms I'm looking at for someone is doing the second one, and I think I saw something the other day that said they've changed the rules and I'm like WHAT? Why? It's like saying that you want something Red, and also Blue with White, not that you want something Red, Blue, and also White.

Help. Before I go red mark crazy.

[danielle100]

I see the second one all the time, but I teach my high school kids the first. It saves from confusion. That's my vote!

[Quill]

The first. It's much clearer.

But I do get irked by having to put a comma after the first of two adjectives: the small, brown dog.

[Margo]

Both are technically correct, depending on the style manual (Strunk & White and Chicago say use it, Ap says don't), but the extra comma has fallen out of favor as a style in many types of writing. I am old school and like my Oxford Comma. I've written songs in praise of the Oxford Comma, I kid you not.

[sierramcconnell]

I did further research and it said that the not using it was for Australian, UK, and Journalism (to save space).

This was a little out of date:
http://www.protrainco.com/essays/serial-comma.htm

This was more up to date, as much as last year:
http://grammar.about.com/od/grammarfaq/ ... dcomma.htm

Phew. I thought maybe I was out of touch or something. XD They're always changing rules on me!

[polymath]

Both sentences are discipline-appropriate proper. The formal principle, a comma prescriptively precedes the conjunction term. The informal principle, discretionary but consistent style regardless. Formal writing, scholarship, science, medicine, etc. Informal writing, journalism. Legal writing favors the formal principle for its unambiguous certainty but pays for transcripts where economic factors often override; therefore, transcription practice favors informal serial comma style.

Legal anecdote: Scrooge's last testament left all his worldly possessions to be divided in equal proportions among James Wiggins, Mary Alcad and Bob Cratchit. At probate, James insists Scrooge meant for him to have half and Mary and Bob to split half. He has a legal leg to stand on due to the ambiguity of the serial listing. Mary and Bob disagree. They too have a legal leg to stand on. Time to call expert and fact witnesses into probate court to clear up the ambiguity, if possible. Moi, I'd ask to examine several samples of Scrooge's writing to check for consistency and offer an expert opinion on his ordinary custom and habit.

Formal style principles generally, and specifically in terms of the serial comma principle, enjoy a luxury of publication space. Books don't like to look like mullet wrappers and bird cage liners. The informal principle is based on an economy of space. Magazines and digests don't like to look like hoity-toity door stops and dust collectors.

Creative writing straddles a tenuous divide between luxury and economy of space. By and large, most traditional book publishers lean toward formal style with regard to the serial comma. However, the informal serial comma principle gained ground during the heydays of The Chicago Manual of Style 14th edition, which downstyled the formal principle of the 13th and previous editions, and reverted to the formal preference for the 15th edition, with discretionary caveats. Words into Type also favors the informal serial comma principle for prose publication. A new generation of prose editors have come onboard at fantastical genre book publishers, who came up from journalism and digest publication roots and brought their at times insistent principles and style manuals with them.

An enlightened creative writing editor doesn't insist on anything more than consistency of style anymore. No playing at irreproachable authority by competent, proficient editors no more. Ultimately, like everything else, it's a writers' obligation to get it right and proper and consistent according to a target audience's sentiments.
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While I understand your resistance, Quill, to commas separating adjectives, it's based on the same principle as serial commas. A punctuation principle substitutes a comma for an elided word. "the small, brown dog." //the small and brown dog.// Conversely, a small-tail dog or a small retriever dog.

Serial commas depict elisions for asyndeton, absent conjunctions: A, B, and C, or A, B and C, mean A and B and C. Another prescriptive principle calls for every conjunction term to be preceded by a comma, albeit steadily losing ground since the dawn of Modern English. A, and B, and C. The contemporary formal serial comma principle is a comparatively modern compromise.

Note: or, nor, but, with, so, for, yet, whether, not only, after, although, as if, as much as, as long as, as soon as, as though, as well as, provided that, because, before, even if, even though, if, in that, in order that, lest, since, so that, than, that, though, unless, until, when, whenever, where, wherever, which, who, whom, while, and similar terms also serve as conjunction terms in many syntatical contexts, though they could be other parts of speech as well.
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Oh, and serial comma principles in other English dialect style manuals pretty much compare to U.S. principles. The New Hart's Rules, 2005, is comparable for British prose publishing to Chicago.

[Quill]

While I understand your resistance, Quill, to commas separating adjectives, it's based on the same principle as serial commas. A punctuation principle substitutes a comma for an elided word. "the small, brown dog." //the small and brown dog.// Conversely, a small-tail dog or a small retriever dog.

Serial commas depict elisions for asyndeton, absent conjunctions: A, B, and C, or A, B and C, mean A and B and C. Another prescriptive principle calls for every conjunction term to be preceded by a comma, albeit steadily losing ground since the dawn of Modern English. A, and B, and C. The contemporary formal serial comma principle is a comparatively modern compromise.

Note: or, nor, but, with, so, for, yet, whether, not only, after, although, as if, as much as, as long as, as soon as, as though, as well as, provided that, because, before, even if, even though, if, in that, in order that, lest, since, so that, than, that, though, unless, until, when, whenever, where, wherever, which, who, whom, while, and similar terms also serve as conjunction terms in many syntatical contexts, though they could be other parts of speech as well.

Okay, but if my hero Cormac McCarthy can do away with commas between adjectives, then by golly so can I. Just kidding, I'm dutifully putting them between all double qualifiers in my WIP. Maybe in the future...

Of course, Cormac also eschews quote marks on dialog, hyphens (funnylooking), em dashes, and apostrophes in word conjunctions (dont, cant), so I know he's not the final word on grammar rules.

[MysticFiddler]

What are you trying to say?

Red and blue combined with white (red, blue and white)
or
Red and blue and white as distinct components? (red, blue, and white)

It's all simple logic.

And Quill, it is perfectly all right in today's writing style to omit the first comma in a short sentence as in your example. I personally loathe the indefiniteness of today's composition and wish we could go back to the Queen's English. By gawd, the rules meant something then!

[Sommer Leigh]

I am like Margo and worship at the alter of the Oxford Comma. There is no other punctuation I love and cherish more.

APA style manual, however, does not allow for it and working in a hospital means that is what I am supposed to use. I don't. I am an Oxford Comma rebel. VIVA LA PUNCTUATION.

[Doug Pardee]

I do get irked by having to put a comma after the first of two adjectives: the small, brown dog.

I believe that most of the style specifications say that you don't put a comma in an adjective list before a color. Also, the color is normally placed as the final adjective in the list. So, "a small brown dog" and "a small, shaggy dog".

The important thing is to jump all over other peoples' use of commas. The best defense is a good offense.

[polymath]

And then there's going rogue for originality's sake. The penultimate gibbertyflop outcome of Postmodernism, think consciously, critically, conscientiously for one's self and do as one self-gratifyingly wishes, so long as readers reading ease is reasonably facilitated, and in some artful way the choices and self-imposed deviations from Standard Written English decorously suit. Decorum: suiting one's topics and words and grammar and actions and such to the subject matter, the circumstances, and the audience. When in Rome, you know.

Cormac McCarthy's works are prime examples of Postmodern Western genre modern decorum. Brad Land imitates McCarthy's and Tobias Wolff's flairs for Postmodern deviations in Goat, a Roman à clef memoir reporting a harrowing introduction into early adult frat brat life. Tobias Wolff's signal work, This Boy's Life: A Memoir, another Roman à clef memoir, reports a young adult journey of self-discovery through teenage rebellion and pathological lying and dress rehearsing self-identities.

You-all has moi's permission to follow suit, you legless, goldarned motherloving, four-flushing sons and daughters of britches. I'm moving on into the next literary movement's dawn, Multiculturalism, a natural progression from Postmodernism, seeking meaningfully self-realized answers to the self-aware questions and challenges Postmodernism poses. Jonathan Franzen is a leader of the Multiculturalism pack. J.K. Rowling's in the pelaton, among others. Stephenie Meyer's got a dog in the hunt running with the big dogs.

[Margo]

You-all has moi's permission to follow suit, you legless, goldarned motherloving, four-flushing sons and daughters of britches. I'm moving on into the next literary movement's dawn, Multiculturalism, a natural progression from Postmodernism, seeking meaningfully self-realized answers to the self-aware questions and challenges Postmodernism poses. Jonathan Franzen is a leader of the Multiculturalism pack. J.K. Rowling's in the pelaton, among others. Stephenie Meyer's got a dog in the hunt running with the big dogs.

There are times, polymath, when I think you'd make an excellent character in Fallout New Vegas.

[polymath]

There's a game or two I bet they'd put you in too, Margo.

[Margo]

There's a game or two I bet they'd put you in too, Margo.

I'd make a great evil computer, sending my robotic minions to kill the player character.

For Fallout New Vegas, I'd rather be a ranger (cuz their clothes are cool), and NCR sniper (cuz they're the last thing you never see), or one of the casino owners (cuz they get to say 'baby' and 'doll' a lot). Or a gun runner (cuz they're rolling in caps and tech).

[polymath]

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