FOUR!

My team presented our rhetoric card yesterday, so this is my extended by one day blog post.

What can capital letters do?
Capital letters can be very helpful at times. When you want to scream at someone over text message, simply use all-caps, and nine times out of ten the receiving end will act wounded and wonder why you are yelling at them. What really used to annoy me was when my high school science teachers would use all caps for any piece of writing he or she did. A) It was hard to read, and B) I didn't like the fact that it looked like the teacher was screaming at me. It's almost like all-caps takes the place of the exclamation mark.

Do I think any punctuation marks should be made?
I had never thought of this until class yesterday. Who ever takes the liberty to say, "we need more punctuation marks?" Well we did in class, and I was intrigued with the amount of ideas that came to my mind! There are so many times that I wish there was a specific punctuation mark to express what I am trying to convey in that moment. Sometimes confusion, maybe another time tiredness. Solomon drops the following definition for punctuation: "The use of standard marks and signs in writing and printing to separate works into sentences, clauses, and phrases in order to clarify meaning" (Solomon). Notice that I bolded the last two words. In an era where sarcasm is normal in everyday language, a punctuation mark that could clarify when a smart remark or sarcastic reply is being communicated would be awesome. A question mark tells the reader that the words are forming a question. All caps communicates—sometimes—screaming. Exclamation mark conveys excitement. A semi-colon—that is when it is used correctly—communicates, "Hey, I'm a good writer". We need a punctuation mark to let the reader know that sarcasm is taking place. I suggest the funny bone (which I can't seem to type on this blog) as the said punctuation mark, as well as the winner of the 10 extra credit points.

Thanks for stopping by.


Solomon, Martin. "The Power of Punctuation." Design Issues Spring VI.2 (1990): 28-32. Print.