Semicolon Usage in British Literature Drops Nearly 50% Since 2000 (smithsonianmag.com)
- Reference: 0178118899
- News link: https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/06/20/159208/semicolon-usage-in-british-literature-drops-nearly-50-since-2000
- Source link: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/could-the-semicolon-die-out-a-recent-study-finds-a-marked-decline-in-its-usage-180986689/
A survey of young learners in the London Student Network found that more than half of respondents could not correctly use semicolons, with only 11% describing themselves as frequent users. The average score on a semicolon knowledge quiz was 49%.
[1] https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/could-the-semicolon-die-out-a-recent-study-finds-a-marked-decline-in-its-usage-180986689/
Why? (Score:2)
I'm not sure why; semi-colons can be cool.
Re: (Score:2)
Because; almost nobody uses them correctly.
Re: (Score:3)
I rarely use semicolons.
When I do, my grammar checker always complains.
Grammar checkers may be the reason for the decline in semicolons.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah I agree largely that if our only source of truth is Word telling us that our application of grammar rules are wrong based our long forgotten understanding of the fundamentals we learned as 8 year olds then perhaps society should ditch punctuation as an archaism to be misused inadvertently through enraging those grammar n*zis whom we unconsciously seek to antagonize.
That or shorter sentences, unlike the one above. But even what I wrote in the previous didn't even have a verb nor a subject but you got th
Re: (Score:2)
Gen-Z doesn't vibe with semicolons, but they ain't all about that Punctuation life either. Them people do vibe code like their lit on fire! They lowkey mix up "your" and "you're" or "it" and "it's." And tbh, we randomly capitalize Words for the aesthetic, y'know? Wtf is this, German? On Fleek, freak!
lulz (Score:1)
most ppl if ur not b00mer not uze it lol
tl;dr (Score:3)
tl;dr
99% (Score:2, Troll)
99% of everything I type ends with a semicolon.
The other 1% are comments.
Kernighan and Richie would be proud (Score:2)
Collect your gold geek badge on the way out.
Fucking python weenies (Score:1)
;;
Re: (Score:2)
He also followed that quote up with a line: "And I realize some of you may be having trouble deciding whether I am kidding or not. So from now on I will tell you when I'm kidding."
Maybe an indicator... (Score:2)
That we are heading inexorably towards mass illiteracy.
"I don't use semicolons FULL STOP" (Score:1)
Says the current generation.
No longer the keepers of the language? (Score:2)
Judging from the British new papers, I'm not surprised at all.
I've noticed the butchering of acronyms (NASA as Nasa or even nasa) for a very long time, and other 'dumbing down' of their language.
It's as if they've taken ee cumming's style to a new extreme.
Semicolons are between a comma and a period (Score:2)
Semicolons create a harder stop than a comma, to encapsulate a thought; but not as hard a stop as a period, which is a more complete encapsulation of a thought.
Implication? People are expressing less compound thoughts in sentences, they stylistically seek faster flow and harder stops perhaps? Does social media consumption impact how people write and express thoughts? Article doesn't say, but interesting result regardless.
Hemingway (Score:2)
Channel Ernest, no semicolons.
Quiz (Score:5, Informative)
Here's a quiz if you want to see your semicolon skills for yourself. Quite humbling.
[1]https://style.mla.org/quiz-sem... [mla.org]
[1] https://style.mla.org/quiz-semicolons/