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Punctuational Ambiguity

The document discusses how lack of or improper punctuation can cause ambiguity and potentially alter the meaning of sentences. It provides several examples of sentences that have very different meanings depending on whether or not they include commas or other punctuation marks. Precise punctuation is important for clarity of communication and preventing potential misunderstandings.

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Theresa Pojas
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359 views7 pages

Punctuational Ambiguity

The document discusses how lack of or improper punctuation can cause ambiguity and potentially alter the meaning of sentences. It provides several examples of sentences that have very different meanings depending on whether or not they include commas or other punctuation marks. Precise punctuation is important for clarity of communication and preventing potential misunderstandings.

Uploaded by

Theresa Pojas
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Bottom Line:

 Lack—or overuse—of punctuation


(especially commas) can alter meaning
and/or result in ambiguity.
 Ambiguous sentences are hard to understand
and can be misinterpreted, thus potentially
putting lives at risk.

 Example 1:
 “Most of the time, travellers worry about their
luggage.”
 Now delete the comma after the fourth word to
totally change the meaning of this sentence:

 “Most of the time travellers worry


about their luggage”
 Example 2:
 “Stop clubbing baby seals”

"Let's eat Grandma." vs. "Let's eat, Grandma!"


A comma: the difference between respecting your
elders, and cannibalism.

A woman: without her, man is nothing.


A woman without her man is nothing.

Dear John:
I want a man who knows what love is all about.
You are generous, kind, thoughtful. People who are
not like you admit to being useless and inferior.
You have ruined me for other men. I yearn for you.
I have no feelings whatsoever when we're apart. I
can be forever happy--will you let me be yours?
Jane

Unfortunately, John was far from pleased. In fact,


he was heartbroken. You see, John was familiar
with Jane's peculiar ways of misusing punctuation
marks. And so to decipher the true meaning of her
email, he had to re-read it with the marks altered:

Dear John:
I want a man who knows what love is. All about
you are generous, kind, thoughtful people, who are
not like you. Admit to being useless and inferior.
You have ruined me. For other men, I yearn. For
you, I have no feelings whatsoever. When we're
apart, I can be forever happy. Will you let me be?
Yours,
Jane

With the oxford Comma:


We invited the strippers, JFK, and Stalin.
Without the oxford comma:
We invited the strippers, JFK and Stalin.

 When I sing well, ladies feel sick.


 When I sing, well ladies feel sick.

 Watch out – man eating apes!


 Watch out – man-eating apes!

 The man dropped the bullet in his mouth.


 The man dropped, the bullet in his mouth.

Wanted: One night stand


Wanted: One-Night Stand

Dear Mother-in-Law,

It was a shame you had to stay here. For such a


short time, I thought I might have coped, but it
was unbearable. Seeing you leave, the relief was
immense. When I heard we might see you again
soon, I wanted to end it all. By saying goodbye
now, I hope I will not have to say it to you again
for a long time. If you have the opportunity to
spend Christmas elsewhere next year, please do.

Not much love


Matthew

Mother-in-law had a mini heart-attack after


reading this letter, so she decided to be the good
person and assume that the above letter had
punctuation misplaced and it actually read like
this-

Dear Mother-in-Law,

It was a shame you had to stay here for such a


short time. I thought I might have coped, but it
was unbearable seeing you leave. The relief was
immense when I heard we might see you again
soon. I wanted to end it all by saying goodbye
now. I hope I will not have to say it to you again
for a long time. If you have the opportunity to
spend Christmas elsewhere next year, please do
not.
Much love
Matthew

AMBIGUITY THROUGH PUNCTUATION

Search Google for "punctuation ambiguity" and


you will come up with some interesting results.
Punctuation ambiguity, it seems, is a psychological
hypnosis technique. Interesting—but not what
we're going to focus on here. For us, punctuation
ambiguity is ambiguity due to punctuation—or lack
thereof.

Ambiguity through punctuation is probably the


most common type of ambiguity that one
encounters nowadays (thanks to texting and email).
While you can often figure out what the speaker
means to say despite an ambiguity, it will probably
take a good deal more effort decoding it than it
would have for the speaker to punctuate correctly
in the first place. We'll begin with a perpetually
relevant example. Suppose you were to read this:
"I like cooking my grandmother and my dog."

What is your reaction? Presumably, disgust. At the


very least, curiosity. Why? Because there is
nothing truly ambiguous about the sentence above.
We must assume, rather, that the speaker did
not mean to betray a liking for cooking his or her
family and pets. This leaves us to assume that the
speaker meant to punctuate like so:

"I like cooking, my grandmother, and my dog."

Much more family-friendly. Now consider these:

"Woman: without her, man is a savage."

"Woman, without her man, is a savage."

Without punctuation, the two sentences are


identical. With their respective punctuation, the
meaning is changed quite significantly. The same
could be said for the statements "No, don't
stop!" and "No! Dont! Stop!" But you get the
point.

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