This grammar lesson is by request… and it's a tricky one!
Why use semicolons?
Semicolons are most often used to add variety and flow. You might look at them as cosmetics for your writing. They add variety and allow you to separate related thoughts while incorporating them into one sentence – thus relieving "choppiness."
With the exception of a use I'll explain in a minute, they're used to separate two closely related clauses that could stand on their own as sentences.
For instance:
You would say "The house was completely trashed; Sally doubted that she'd ever find a buyer."
You would not say "The house was completely trashed; Sally had six phone calls to return." (One has nothing to do with the other.)
You would say "Snow was falling heavily; Sally worried about going out on the roads."
You would not say "Snow was falling heavily; Sally had chicken salad for lunch." (Again, one has nothing to do with the other.)
Note that if you preferred to do so, you could use a comma and a conjunction instead of a semicolon. "The house was completely trashed, so Sally doubted that she'd ever find a buyer."
You could also simply place a period between the two parts, but the result would be choppy. The semicolon helps draw them together and emphasize their relationship while it "smooths out" the copy. Which to use is up to the writer.
One Rule to remember: You do NOT use a conjunction and a semicolon together.
However (and here's one of the tricky parts) you DO use a semicolon with a conjunctive adverb. (I know, I know. And I'm sure no one even tried to teach me about conjunctive adverbs back in school.)
A conjunctive adverb is much like a conjunction, but longer. Conjunctions are short words like and, but, and so; Conjunctive adverbs are words like however, therefore, and consequently.
An example of this use would be "Sally was on vacation; therefore it fell to her broker to deal with the angry seller." Note the cause and effect nature of this kind of sentence.
If you prefer not to use the semicolon, you could use a comma and change "therefore" to "so."
One more common use of semicolons…the place where they really are necessary
Use semicolons in those cases where not using them would cause confusion. Semicolons serve to properly separate the parts when you are writing a list of items that include commas. For instance, "Sally currently has clients who are relocating to Boise from Austin, Texas; Miami, Florida; Seattle, Washington; and San Diego, California."
You can ignore semicolons and use periods or commas and conjunctions in almost every other case, but when writing lists such as this, semicolons are the only choice. Commas would just cause a mush of confusion.
Grammar graphic courtesy of Stuart Miles@freedigitalphotos.net | Confused monkey courtesy of morguefile.com
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