精品文档,助力人生,欢迎关注小编! 英文论文写作中标点符号应注意事项 Punctuation Bad punctuation can often make even the best writing unintelligible. On the other hand, good punctuation can make your meaning clear and your language effective. English punctuation generally differs from that of other European languages; even though there is often considerable room for personal preferences, a mastery of the basic rules is indispensable. There is one overriding principle: to use the bare minimum of punctuation necessary to keep the writing intelligible. The following list of rules makes no claim to exhaustiveness. I. The Apostrophe (') 1. men's, women's, children's, people's It is correct to write this area's problems, meaning "the problems of this area", and these areas' problems, meaning "the problems of these areas": in fact, putting apostrophes anywhere else would be wrong. But the plurals of man, woman, and child are exceptions to this general rule: thus we write the men's wives, the women's husbands, the children's mothers, and nothing else. Another important exception is the word people when it denotes the plural of "person": thus we would write these people's behavior, meaning "the behavior of these persons", but these peoples' behavior, meaning "the behavior of these peoples" (i.e. ethnic groups). Other irregular plurals are treated in the same way as men, women, children, and people: above all the plurals of ox, sheep, goose and mice (e.g. the oxen's pasture, the sheep's wool, the geese's flight, the mice's tails). 2. A mistake that is frequent among foreign learners of English is to write a phrase such as "these area's problems", when what the person actually means is these problems of the area. 3. It is best to use the apostrophe when you want to show the plural of something which cannot normally be plural: The past tense of occur is spelt with two r's. I accept the idea in principle, but there are a lot of if’s. 4. Strings of apostrophes are to be avoided. Thus one should write the friends of that man's son, instead of "that man's son's friends". 5. We say in ten days' time, in twenty years' time (i.e. we use the apostrophe). 6. We say each other's, not "each others'" (e.g. to get on each other's nerves). II. The Colon (:) 1. Quotations The colon is often used to introduce quotations: To quote Nietzsche: "God is dead!" As the bard (One of an ancient Celtic order of minstrel poets who composed and recited verses celebrating the legendary exploits of chieftains and heroes.