A Word, Please: Seven times commas are optional

Let’s eat, Grandma!

Let’s eat Grandma!

As anyone who’s chuckled at this well-worn punctuation joke can attest, commas matter. A comma can even make the difference between a friendly invitation to break bread and cannibalism.

But that doesn’t mean you should stress over every comma in everything you write. Sometimes, commas are optional. Here are seven times when you get to choose.

Serial commas. Much has been written about the serial or Oxford comma, which comes before the conjunction in a list of three or more things, like the second comma in “red, white, and blue.” I’ve written a thorough discussion of why it’s optional. But in brief, just know that you can use it or not as long as you’re consistent.

Between independent clauses. Punctuation rules say you should put a comma between independent clauses connected with a conjunction, for example: “Peter works hard, and he plays hard.” An independent clause contains both a subject and a verb. The noun “Peter” and the pronoun “he” are both subjects and each has its own verb, hence the comma in my example. But the rules are flexible. If both independent clauses are short and your meaning is clear without a comma, you can leave it out: Peter works hard and he plays hard.

Before “too,” “also” or “either.” When I was a kid, I was told in no uncertain terms that “too” should be set off with commas, as should “also,” “either” and similar terms. So you can imagine my surprise when, decades later, I looked it up. None of my punctuation or grammar guides says you must set these words off with commas. I still do because it seems to help the sentence and because old habits die hard. But there’s nothing wrong with leaving the comma out.

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Around “Inc.,” “Ltd.,” “LLC,” etc. It’s logical to put commas around “Inc.” or similar terms in a business name: Widgets, Inc. But there’s no risk of confusion if you leave it out: Widgets Inc. That’s why some editing styles say to not set off “Inc.” with commas. To be more precise, these same style guides say you should usually leave out “Inc.” altogether. But when it make sense to include “Inc.,” commas are optional.

Around Jr. and Sr. After a name, “Jr.” and “Sr.” work a lot like “Inc.” They add extra information. So it’s no surprise that they follow the same rule: Commas around them are optional.

After a short introductory phrase. A lot of times, we set up the main part of a sentence with a phrase. Case in point: the phrase “a lot of times” in the last sentence. The rules say that introductory phrases should be followed by a comma, which makes sense when the phrase is long: “A lot of times when we native English speakers formulate a unit known as a sentence, we start with an introductory phrase.” Here, the comma helps keep all those words organized. But when the introductory phrase is very short, like “On Tuesday” in “On Tuesday I go to class,” you can omit the comma if you like.

Around unambiguous appositives. “My wife, Lea, our dog, Spike, my boss, Jennifer, and our plumber, Jay, are here.” An appositive, which is a noun that restates a noun immediately before it, should technically be set off with commas. So when you write “my wife, Lea,” the name “Lea” is appositive to “my wife.” When you leave the comma out, you’re saying that the name “Lea” isn’t a restating of “my wife” but instead it’s needed to clarify the noun “wife.” So technically, without a comma you’re saying that her name is there to indicate which of your multiple wives you’re talking about. But as you can see in the first sentence of this section, sometimes this rule is impractical. In those cases, you can write “my wife Lea” without implying that you have others.

June Casagrande is the author of “The Joy of Syntax: A Simple Guide to All the Grammar You Know You Should Know.” She can be reached at [email protected].