KNOWLEDGE

How to use semi-colons

Semi-colons are used to join to co-ordinate clauses into a single sentence. One way to think of the semi-colon is as a bit like the conjunction and that you use to join two simple sentences together to form a compound sentence. (e.g. This is a simple sentence and this is another simple sentence). The semi-colon has a similar function.

When to use a semi colon

Use a semi-colon when you want to form a bond between two complete sentences, typically when they are related to or contrasted with one another. For example:

  • Johnny always cleans his teeth at night; he has very healthy gums.

In this example the relationship between cleaning his teeth and having healthy gums is strengthened by the semi-colon. The fact Johnny always cleans his teeth is clearly connected to his healthy gums.

When not to use a semi-colon

When this is not the case you should use a full-stop. For example:

  • Johnny always cleans his teeth at night. He has very neat hair.

Here, Johnny’s teeth-cleaning routine does not need to be connected to his neat hair, so a full-stop is used instead of a semi-colon.

The trick is seeing a connection between the statements

The trick with the semi-colon is working out when the statements are connected. Here are some more examples:

  • The ice cream van drove past my house today; the driver had green hair.

  • My aunt wears huge glasses; she looks like an owl.

In all of the semi-colon examples in this guide, a full-stop could be used instead of a semi-colon to create two separate sentences, and it would still be grammatically correct. However, the semi-colon suggests a stronger bond between the statements so works best in cases like these.  Plus, a correctly used semi-colon will get you more marks for punctuation.

Having said that, read the Important Final Note on this. It’s very important.

IMPORTANT FINAL NOTE

If in doubt, use a full-stop instead of the semi-colon. It’s safer and almost never wrong. And a full-stop is infinitely preferable to the worst thing you could do — the very worst — which is to join two sentences with a comma. This is called comma-splicing, and it’s the worst thing in the world.

Previous
Previous

How to use commas

Next
Next

How to demarcate paragraphs