How to use the SEMI-COLON in English writing

Hi. I'm Rebecca from engVid. Today you will learn a simple but very important way to improve

your English and to take it to a higher level. And that is because right now I'm going to

unlock the mystery of the semicolon for you. So, what is a semicolon? How do you use it?

When do you use it? I'm going to explain all of that to you. And even if you've never used

it by the end of this lesson, I'm sure you will start using it. Okay? So, let's get started.

So, first of all, what is a semicolon? A semicolon looks like this. Okay? It consists of a period

and a comma, and it's a little punctuation mark that makes a big difference in your academic

and professional writing. All right? Now, if you start using this, and let's not say

"if", let's say "when" you start using the semicolon, you will get higher grades in your

assignments and tests and exams and essays. You will impress your employers and your boss

and your clients because you'll be writing better. And most important, you will come

across as a more educated, a more intelligent, and a more advanced thinking kind of person,

which all of these advantages are advantages I'm sure you want to have. So, even if you've

never used a semicolon before, no worries, or if you've used it but you weren't sure

if you were using it correctly or not, I'm going to explain to you exactly when we use

it, why we use it, and how we use it. And last, I'll explain to you how not to use it.

All right? Let's get started.

So, the most important thing about the semicolon is that it links ideas. What is the difference

between using a period and using a semicolon? Well, a period divides ideas and sentences,

and a semicolon links or connects the ideas and thoughts and sentences. All right? That's

the most important purpose of the semicolon, to show that we have one sentence, then we

have a second sentence, but this second sentence is connected to, has some link to the first

sentence. And we show that by using a semicolon in the middle. So, let me show you some examples

so you understand exactly what I mean. Okay?

All right, so the first thing the semicolon does is that it shows a connection between

two sentences. Now, that's important. I said two sentences, not two parts of sentences,

not two dependent clauses. No. Two complete sentences. That means both sides before the

semicolon and after the semicolon have to be complete sentences by themselves. There

are a few small changes, which I will explain, but first of all, remember that both sides

have to be complete sentences. Let's look at an example.

This is without the semicolon, first of all. "It is raining. Period.", "You should take

an umbrella. Period.", okay? Two sentences. Is it wrong to write like this? No, it's not

wrong, but if you want to write a little more powerfully, a little more effectively, and

a little bit more in an advanced way, then you could do this. You could say, "It is raining;

you should take an umbrella." Now, what was the result of using the semicolon?

We showed that this second sentence, "You should take an umbrella", this second idea

is linked or connected to the first sentence, right? You should take an umbrella. Why? Because

it's raining. So, those ideas are connected, they flow from each other, and we want to

show that there is a connection. All right? So, what did we do? Instead of the period,

we put a semicolon. Second thing that we did, the second thing is that the sentence, even

though it's a complete sentence, but when it follows the semicolon, here we had a capital

letter, but when it follows the semicolon, we have to make it a small letter, unless

it's like a name or something like that, which normally you would write with a capital letter,

but otherwise you make it a small letter. All right? So, semicolon and small letter

usually.

Let's look at another example. "I'm feeling unwell; I can't go to the meeting." All right?

Again, the two ideas are connected, right? So, instead of having two short sentences,

we want to show the connection by using the semicolon. Here, I didn't use a small letter

because I always write the letter - the word "I" as a capital letter, so that's fine.

Let's look at another example. "The baby is afraid; she doesn't trust strangers." So again,

we want to show a connection between these two ideas or thoughts, so we used the semicolon

and we used a small letter, not a capital letter, after the semicolon. Okay? Now, this

is the most important way in which we use the semicolon. So, if you understand this,

then you've understand - you've understood, I would say, 80% of it or 90% of it. Okay?

Let's look at a few more situations in which we use the semicolon. So, this punctuation

mark is also used to clarify confusing information in a list. What do we mean? Let's look at

this sentence, it's a long sentence, and right now it does not have any semicolons, so let's

read it and see what happens. "The scholarship recipients are Maria Flores from Cancun, Mexico;

John Colt from London, England; and Gilles Dubois from Paris, France." Now, it's a little

bit confusing, right? Like, where's Cancun, what's - there's Cancun, Mexico, John Colt,

London, England, it's very confusing, so we want to separate these in some way, right?

So, this is what you do. It's really easy, it's actually fun. So, let's do it together.

"The scholarship recipients are", who are they? "Maria Flores from Cancun, Mexico", right?

That's all we're going to say about Maria, so there we take out the comma and we put

a semicolon, alright? Sorry, I'll put it - I'll write it properly, okay? Now we know that's

Maria Flores from Cancun, Mexico. Next, we have John Colt from London, England, right?

That's one other piece of information. We don't keep a comma here, we put another semicolon

here, because then we know John Colt from London, England is all one piece of information.

Not to be confused with Maria from Cancun. And the last part is "And Gilles Dubois from

Paris, France". Now, this list of information becomes much easier to understand, okay? So,

that's the second way in which we use the semicolon. Let's look at a couple of other

ways that we also use this important punctuation mark.

Okay, now let's look at three more ways in which we use the semicolon, alright? So, we

also use it to connect two sentences which are linked by transitional expressions, alright?

Or conjunctive adverbs, don't worry if you don't know what those are, I'll give you some

examples. Words like "however", "nevertheless", "therefore", "thus", "in addition", "consequently",

"also", "still". So, if the second sentence, alright, starts with one of these or the second

thought starts with one of these kind of words, then we can use a semicolon before it and

a comma after this word. Let me show you an example. Don't get worried, you'll do it,

I know you will. So, let's take this example. He wants to study overseas; therefore, he

needs to take the IELTS, alright? The IELTS is an English proficiency exam. So, why did

we use a semicolon? We could have just used a period. Yes, you know that, you know the

answer to that. We want to show a little more of a connection between these two ideas, right?

Between these two sentences. That's why we used the semicolon. Also, because it sounds

and looks a little more academic, a little more sophisticated, right? And you want to

appear like that. So, we said he wants to study overseas; therefore, now remember, "therefore",

because it's coming after the semicolon, has to be a small letter, not a capital letter,

and then we put a comma and we say whatever else we have to say, okay? Alright. So, that's

another way in which we use the semicolon, and it's a very common way of writing in academic

circles, alright?

Number four, the semicolon adds style, it adds variety, it adds a little more interest

to our writing, and a little more depth to our writing. So, instead of just writing short,

choppy sentences, which sounds a little bit more like how children write, by using the

semicolon, it becomes a little bit more interesting. For example, "She works all day", semicolon,

"She takes classes at night." Here also, it's connected. It's kind of connected by what

she does, but it's also connected by the contrast, what she does a day, in the day, what she

does at night, okay?

And last of all, the semicolon, in an indirect way, persuades your reader, okay? That means

if you have an opinion, you can kind of sneak it in there, right, by using the semicolon,

and so it's a bit indirect. It's an indirect way to persuade your reader without coming

out and saying, "This is my opinion." So, let's look at an example of this. "People

are protesting", semicolon, "The government should reconsider its new policy." Alright?

So, now, you see that the writer is coming to a conclusion and trying to lead us to a

conclusion to persuade us, to convince us, to change our mind, and so the writer is saying

the government should reconsider its new policy, and he or she is linking that through the

semicolon to the first fact, which is that people are protesting. So, this is, again,

an indirect way to persuade people. So, we've just looked at five really good reasons why

and how we use the semicolon. Now, we're going to look at a few situations in which you do

not use the semicolon. Alright, so before we start this last part,

I just want to say to you that I'm so glad that you're still watching. It shows me that

you're a really serious student, that you really want to improve your English writing,

and in fact, as I said at the beginning, the semicolon is the way, the only way through

punctuation that you can improve your writing, and it's just by learning how to use this

punctuation mark, right? In fact, on the website of the University of Bristol, which is one

of the top universities in the UK, they actually say about the semicolon that it's a hugely

important punctuation mark, okay, and hugely powerful punctuation mark, and that they suggest

that you start using it, and by using it, you'll get higher grades and you'll impress

your employers, all the things I was telling you earlier. So, imagine if a university is

actually suggesting and recommending that you use the semicolon, how important it must,

in fact, be, okay? So, let's continue now, and when we don't use the semicolon.

So, we do not use it to connect two incomplete sentences, because as I mentioned in the beginning,

if you're going to use a semicolon, both sides have to be complete sentences already. So,

for example, in this sentence, I like staying up late, comma, even though I need to get

up early. I like staying up late. If we stopped it there, that could be a full sentence, but

what about this part? Even though I need to get up early. No. Even though I need to get

up early, it's not a complete sentence. So, in this case, we just use the comma, we do

not use the semicolon, alright?

Next, you cannot use the semicolon between complete sentences that include what are called

coordinating conjunctions. Now, many of you who are a little more advanced in English

may have learned about these coordinating conjunctions, which are sometimes abbreviated

as "fanboys". So, for example, the words "for", "and", "nor", "but", "or", "yet", "so". If

you see one of these words in your sentence, you cannot use the semicolon, alright?

For example, let me see what we can do here. If we said, "I like staying up late", oh sorry,

"I need to get up early, but I like staying up late", in that example, we could not use

the semicolon. But if you said, "I need to get up early", semicolon, "however, I like

staying up late", that we could do because "however" was one of the words we could use.

But these, which are called fanboys, if you see one of these short, simple conjunctions,

then don't use the semicolon.

Last, don't use the semicolon if you're introducing a list of something. If you're doing that,

then what you want to use is a colon instead. That's a colon, right? "Please bring the essentials",

colon, "your passport, ticket, and luggage", alright? So, whenever you're going to start

the list, then you can put just a colon.

And last of all, don't use the semicolon very often. Even though I told you that it's very

important to use it and it will give you higher grades, at the same time, it's like a diamond.

You don't want to see it too much. It'll sparkle when we use it a little bit. So, for example,

in an essay, if it was a five-paragraph essay, you could maybe use it once in each paragraph,

but not more than once in each paragraph, because then it becomes a bit too heavy. And

instead of using it for your benefit, it's then just drawing away from the effectiveness

of your writing, okay?

Now, one last thing that I want to tell you is a sort of like a little review, a quick

review of everything we've learned about the semicolon, and that's to tell you that if

you're unsure at any time whether you can use the semicolon or not, try this test. Look

at the sentences and see if you could put a period there. If you could use a period

between these two sentences, then you can use a semicolon. But if you cannot use a period,

like here, if you cannot use a period, then don't use the semicolon. That's a quick way

to check whether you're using the semicolon correctly or not, okay?

This was such an important lesson, I can't even tell you. I'm so proud of you. Your writing

is going to be so much more advanced once you start using this and once you become comfortable

with it, alright? So, in order to make sure that you know it well, please go to our website

at www.engvid.com. There, you can do a quiz on this and really consolidate whatever you

have learned. And also, subscribe to my YouTube channel to get lots more videos that will

help you improve in speaking, writing, pronunciation, and lots of other things, okay? Thanks very,

very much for watching, and all the best with your English. Bye for now.