Punctuation:

biāo diǎn

①Punctuation mark. ② Add punctuation marks lt; verb gt;: ~ Twenty-Four Histories to works that originally had no punctuation (such as ancient books).

Punctuation marks are a set of symbols that assist written language. Its function: a represents pause, b represents tone, and c represents the nature and function of the word. Divided into two categories: dots and labels. The period is divided into mid-sentence punctuation (pause, comma, semicolon, colon) and sentence-end punctuation (period, question mark, exclamation mark). The function of the dot mark is to punctuate and indicate the tone and pause of speech; the function of the mark is to indicate, mainly indicating the nature and function of certain words or sentences in written language. In recent years, the examination of punctuation marks in the college entrance examination has focused on application rather than terminology, focusing on the knowledge and skills of candidates in mastering the usage of various punctuation marks. Usage:

The position of the punctuation at the end of the quotation

If the quote is used as a complete and independent statement, then in order to maintain the complete independence of the quotation, the punctuation at the end should be placed within quotation marks. For example: In short, in any work, you must remember: "Humility makes people progress, and pride makes people fall behind." (Wu Han "Speaking of Humility")

If the quoter only takes the quote as his own is a component, then there must be no punctuation at the end, and the punctuation must be placed outside the quotation marks. For example: I have looked at Mount Tai from the train many times in the past few decades. Every time I think of the sentence "Confucius climbed the east mountain and made Lu small, and climbed Mount Tai and made the world small." The cultural tradition is like a debt. (Li Jianwu's "Climbing Mount Tai in the Rain")

If the punctuation at the end of the quotation is a question mark or an exclamation mark, it should generally be retained even if it is part of the author's words.

The use of punctuation before and after the ellipsis

If the ellipsis is preceded by a complete sentence, a period should be added at the end of the sentence. For example: The night is getting long and the road is getting long, so I might as well forget it and not talk about it. But I know that even if it's not me, there will always be a time in the future when I remember them and talk about them again. ...(Lu Xun's "For the Memory of Forgotten")

If the sentence before the ellipsis is not a complete sentence, in principle, no punctuation marks are added.

Punctuation marks are generally not used after the ellipses, because even the text has been omitted, and adding punctuation marks is meaningless.

If there are words after the ellipsis, in order to indicate that these words are far related to the ellipsis and the words before the ellipsis, you can add a period after the ellipsis. For example: There is a long-form trend in creation nowadays: short stories are moving closer to medium-length stories, and medium-length stories are moving closer to long forms. What about long stories? One, two, three…. Of course, there are also some that are long and excellent and must be long, but most of them don’t need to be that long and do have “moisture” to squeeze out. ("Chinese Language Construction", Issue 7, 1991, page 32)

The use of punctuation before and after the dash

When the topic or conversation object suddenly changes, or when there is a leap in semantics, the dash It is often preceded by a period at the end of a sentence to indicate the completeness and independence of the words and meaning before the dash. For example:

(1) After a while, I heard another person say: "What, you all left? It's a rare time to come here, take a bath freely, and not play for a while. - Oops ! Where have my clothes gone? Who has seen my clothes?" ("The Cowherd and the Weaver Girl")

(2) Mr. Lin suddenly raised his head and was facing the old woman, trying to avoid it. Unable to make it, he had to step forward and greet her: "Zhu Santai, are you going out to buy New Year things? Please go inside and sit. - Axiu, come and help Zhu Santai." (Mao Dun's "Lin's Shop")

(3) Hey, houses with dozens of floors, two-story cars, all kinds of beautiful and useful foreign things... fellow! You have to experience it in your life! ——After working for three years, the money you earn in the future will be yours! We are from the same hometown and have friendship.

——Leave it to me to take with you. What’s wrong? Can I still go back to my hometown? (Xia Yan's "Bao Shen Gong")

When expressing annotative discourse, punctuation marks are generally not used before the dash, because it divides the annotation and the annotated language into two parts. When people read the dash, they will naturally pause. Look, no punctuation in front of it will not hinder reading comprehension.

There is no punctuation mark after a dash.

The use of the period after "so-and-so said"

If "so-and-so said" comes before a quotation, it is usually followed by a colon, and some people use a comma. For example:

(1) My companion asked me to go and see it together. I said in a gloomy mood: "Forget it, I won't read it. You go." ("Chinese Prose" Issue 2, 1999)

(2) I said, "Dad, let's go." (Zhu Ziqing's "Back View")

If "so-and-so said" comes after the quotation, it should be followed by a period. . For example: "What's wrong with making everyone smile? I'm missing something," he said. ("Chinese Prose" Issue 2, 1999, page 28)

If "someone said" is in the middle of a quotation, and the quotations before and after it are from a person, a comma must be used after it. For example: "He doesn't believe it," all the stones building the platform said together, "show him immediately and throw him down!" (Ye Shengtao, "Stone Statues of Ancient Heroes")

If "So-and-so "Say" is not followed by a direct quotation, but by paraphrasing the general idea of ??what "so-and-so" said. A comma is generally used after "so-and-so said". For example: My girlfriend went to see her and reported back that she liked the short, tight and hanging floral leather jacket the best, which was very childish.

In ancient times, articles were written without punctuation, making it difficult to read and even lead to misunderstandings. It was not until the Han Dynasty that the "sentence reading" symbol was invented. A short paragraph with complete meaning is called "sentence"; a paragraph with unfinished meaning in the sentence and the tone can be paused is called "reading" (pronounced, equivalent to today's comma). The Song Dynasty used ".", "," to express sentence reading. It was not until the Ming Dynasty that names of people and places appeared. These are the earliest punctuation marks in our country.

The 1919 Preparatory Conference for the Unification of the Mandarin Language specified 12 types of symbols based on my country’s original punctuation marks and with reference to the punctuation marks commonly used in various countries, and was promulgated nationwide by the Ministry of Education at that time. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, the General Administration of Press further summarized the usage rules of punctuation marks and published "The Usage of Punctuation Marks" in 1951. In October of the same year, the Government Affairs Council issued the "Instructions on Learning the Usage of Punctuation Marks." Since then, punctuation marks have become more perfect and have a unified usage. In April 1990, the National Language Working Committee and the Press and Publication Administration revised and promulgated the "Usage of Punctuation Marks", which made new regulations and explanations on punctuation marks and their usage.

New interpretation of punctuation

Punctuation = 4 points

In Chinese spoken language, the word 4 is homophonic for "death". Therefore, people are generally unwilling to use the word 4 points. The number is not willing to say the number with 4.

There is inevitably 4 o'clock on the clock. Now, there is a solution that satisfies both buyers and sellers.

Many watch manufacturers paste their trademarks at the 4 o'clock position, blocking the unlucky number 4.

Consumers do not tear off the trademark after purchasing a watch.

In this way, when the hour hand points to 4 o'clock, it also points to the trademark of this watch.

At 4 o'clock, someone asked "What time is it?", and the answer was "the trademark dot."

So, 4 o'clock is the "punctuation mark" and it became popular. .