Hello everybody welcome back to my channel, Sparkle English, where I teach you how to improve
your level of English, how to improve your English grammar skills, English writing skills and more.
In today's video, I'm going to talk to you about the Oxford comma, or it's also known as the
serial comma. If you have watched my comma rules video, I talk a little bit about the Oxford comma
and that it is optional to use, but some people feel very passionately about using it, and other
people are against using it. So in this video, I'm going to teach you how to use the serial comma,
and why it's important to use it in certain cases. So what is the serial comma, the serial comma
is the comma used after the second to last item in the list of three or more items. This means that
we add a comma before and or or the serial comma is also known as the series comma, the Oxford
comma or the Harvard comma. It's most commonly known as the Oxford comma or the serial comma.
So let's look at some examples. I need to buy flour, eggs, butter, and vanilla to make the cake.
This here is the Oxford comma or the serial comma, the second to last item in a list of three
or more. So if you watched my eight comma rules video, you should already know that we use commas
to separate words and word groups in a simple series of three or more items. So for example,
in this first sentence, I need to buy flour, comma, eggs, comma, you always will have to use
commas after items in a series in a list. However, the comma on the second to last item before the
conjunction and or is optional. That is called the Oxford comma. If you want more examples on
how to use commas in lists, please watch my eight comma rules video. Because this video is focusing
on the second to last comma, the serial comma. We're going to Toronto, Ottawa or Montreal this
summer. Jake has cows, horses and sheep on his farm, would you like tea, coffee or water. In all
of these cases, it is optional. Whether or not you want to use the serial comma. If we take out the
comma in each of these sentences, it still makes sense. However, there are some instances where
using an Oxford comma can prevent confusion and we're going to talk about that in a little bit.
So is the serial comma required. Some style guides require the use of the serial or Oxford comma.
However, other style guides such as the APA style guide do not require its use.
So if you are a student writing an essay, or you are writing for a specific publication,
you will have to follow specific style guidelines that either do or do not require using serial
commas. So if you're in university or in high school, and you're writing an essay,
your teacher will probably tell you that you have to use it or you do not have to use it.
So let's look at this first example. I love chocolate, comma, candy, comma and cake. Again,
this comma here is the Oxford comma. So this is how you would write the sentence
if you were following the Oxford style manual, the Chicago Manual of Style and the MLA style manual.
However, if you were following another style guide, or just simply you don't want to use
the Oxford comma, you would write it like this. I love chocolate, candy and cake with no comma here
after the second to last item in a list before the conjunction. So if you do not have to follow
specific guidelines, you can decide whether or not you prefer to use the serial comma.
However, the most important thing is to be consistent in your writing. So if you are writing
an essay or an article, make sure to either consistently use the serial comma, or do not
use it. Don't mix and match. So if you've decided I'm going to use the Oxford comma, make sure you
use it throughout your entire paper or essay or story or novel. Because if you start using it and
then change it, it becomes inconsistent. The most important thing is consistency.
So now I'm going to tell you why the serial comma is important.
Let's look at these examples. Matt bought glasses, jeans and running shoes.
In this case, we have not used the Oxford comma and it's no problem. We know that Matt has bought
glasses, jeans and running shoes. There's no confusion here. Kate is going to study math,
science and English. Again, there's no confusion here. So It's not that important to use the
Oxford comma. It makes sense if we use it. Or if we don't use it, it's the same.
But what if we have a sentence like this, I would like to thank my parents, Lady Gaga and Elvis.
If you're reading this sentence, it is not clear that you are talking about your parents,
and the Lady Gaga, and Elvis. In this first example, it is written as though your parents
are Lady Gaga and Elvis. I would like to thank my parents, Lady Gaga, and Elvis. Because without the
Oxford comma, Lady Gaga and Elvis, it is written as if those are the names of your parents,
as if Lady Gaga is your mom and Elvis is your dad. So to clear up any confusion,
you want to use the Oxford comma, because it makes it clear that we are talking about
your parents, Lady Gaga, and Elvis as three separate groups. I would like to thank my parents,
Lady Gaga, comma, and Elvis. So the Oxford comma and a sentence like this
is very important because it makes it clear. So let's look at another example.
We invited the clowns Trump and Obama. In this case, if we don't put a comma b Oxford comma
after Trump, it makes it look like we're inviting the clowns named Trump and Obama.
But by putting in the serial comma, or Oxford comma after Trump, it makes it clear that we're
inviting the clowns, Trump and Obama. So this right here is why it's so important to use the
Oxford comma in situations like this, because it's not quite clear. Otherwise, if you're reading it,
if you're referring to the names of the clowns, or if you're referring to three different groups,
the clowns, Trump, and Obama. So as I said before, while the Oxford comma is not completely entirely
necessary, it does help prevent confusion. So now we're going to do some practice. We're going to
play serial commas in the following sentences. I bought cheese, bread and ham at the supermarket.
Where would you put the comma here, you would put it after bread.
Again, in this first sentence, it doesn't really change the sentence putting the comma in, because
it's quite clear, it's three different things. My mom wants to go to Spain, Italy and France.
Again, you don't have to use the Oxford comma. But if you wanted to
put it after Italy, Should we order pizza pasta or curry, the Oxford comma would go after pasta.
Now in these first three sentences, it doesn't really change the meaning of the sentence if
we use the Oxford comma or not, because it's quite obvious. But in these next two sentences,
it does change the meaning. And the first one, Shane invited his best friends, his teacher and
his boss. In this sentence written the way it is without the Oxford comma, it makes it look like
his teacher and his boss are his best friends are Shane's best friends. However, if we put
the Oxford comma after his teacher, it makes it clear we're talking about three different groups,
Shane invited his best friends, and his teacher and his boss, so we know that his teacher and boss
are not his best friends. And the last one, I love my children, Darth Vader and Harry Potter.
And this one, it makes it look like Darth Vader and Harry Potter are your children. And of course,
that's not true. So we want to put in the Oxford comma after Darth Vader,
and that makes it very clear that you're talking about three different groups.
I love my children, Darth Vader, and Harry Potter. Okay, so it is very easy to use the Oxford comma.
Again, it's up to you whether or not you want to use it, but it does help make things
clear when you do use the Oxford comma. So I recommend using it and that way you're not
going to run into any issues people will always understand what exactly it is that you mean.
I hope you guys enjoyed this video. If you do, make sure to click like.
You can check out my English writing essential series by clicking on the description below
to learn all about how to use commas how to capitalize how to use apostrophes and more.
And make sure to subscribe to my channel for more videos just like this one on how
to improve your level of English. Thanks again for watching and I will see you in my next video.