Chemistry

02. Colons and semi-colons

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Colons and semi-colons, best thought of as lying between a comma (small pause) and a full stop (major pause), have distinct, non-interchangeable functions.

Colons have two major uses:

  1. to introduce a list (as here)
  2. to separate two parts of a sentence, the second part explaining or expanding on the first part.
Examples:

Colons should never be followed by a hyphen, and the first word that follows the colon is not capitalised in British English unless capitalised anyway, for example an acronym like DNA, or a proper noun (i.e. a name, for example Joseph Black).

Semi-colons have two major uses: to link two complete sentences that are closely related (i.e. both parts of the sentence have subjects and verbs); and to separate items in a list if the items are long.

N.B. Semi-colons which link sentences together, as in the first two examples, could often be replaced by a full stop.
TaskTask TypeDifficulty
Task 1Multiple choiceEasier
Task 2Multiple choiceModerate
Task 3Multiple choiceEasier
Task 4Multiple choiceMore Challenging
Task 5Multiple choiceMore Challenging
Task 6Multiple choiceModerate
Task 7Multiple choiceMore Challenging
Task 8Multiple choiceModerate