Is the Oxford Comma Too Posh for Luddites?
The origins and uses of Oxford’s contentious comma
Few squiggles in the English language are as divisive as the “Oxford comma.” For such a seemingly innocuous little line on the page — no different in appearance from its regular comma cousin — it’s a shock that the Oxford comma has given way to such a hotbed of controversy among writers and linguists.
Simply stated, the Oxford comma, named after the Oxford University Press, is the final comma in a list of things. It appears just before “and” or “or.” In the sentence, “We invited John, Tim, and Luke,” the Oxford comma is the one after “Tim.” With the comma, Tim and Luke are whole and distinct entities. Without the comma, Tim and Luke appear to function as a unit within the sentence. One might believe that the two are twins, or inseparable like cheese and crackers.
There’s some debate over this furiously contended comma’s origin. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the term “Oxford comma” dates back only as far as 1978 and is attributed to Peter Sutcliffe. But the use of the comma, according to Sutcliffe, dates back at least a century to a language rule book written by F. Howard Collins. Collins, however, claimed the idea originated even further back with Herbert Spencer, the philosopher and political theorist who coined the term “survival of the fittest,” rather than Charles Darwin.
In middle school and high school, I was taught to avoid the Oxford comma completely. I was told that it simply wasn’t necessary to use. But just as omitted commas can lead to eaten grandmas when left out of sentences like “Let’s eat[,] Grandma,” the Oxford comma can be critical.
While cannibalism is less likely to result from omission, the resultant loss in clarity is only a little less heinous. But for most of my career as a writer, I was naive. I believed as I was taught — that that final comma before the end of a sentence was frivolous. Oh, how wrong I was.
It wasn’t until I’d begun writing for Fanfare that I had one of the editors point out that they were an Oxford comma-loving community. Though it took some getting used to, a few weeks later, I’d come to see the error of my ways. I’d begun viewing all those savages who lived their lives bereft of Oxford commas as primitives from a simpler time.
There is actually an argument for why not to use the Oxford comma. Some feel that it creates a feeling of congestion within an article, and that the added clarity they provide isn’t worth the sacrifice to screen real estate. But when we’re talking about a squiggle that’s hardly the size of half of a letter, these space and aesthetic concerns begin to seem trivial.
But to make matters more confusing still, you could build a case that in some scenarios, the Oxford comma, intended strictly to add clarity to sentences, actually only confounds them further. For example, in the following sentence, a reader might potentially be left confused about precisely the contents of each sandwich:
“The picnic included sandwiches with ham and cheese, peanut butter and jelly, and tuna.”
In a video from Vox titled, “The Oxford comma’s unlikely origin,” they cite the following example, where the introduction of an Oxford comma creates ambiguity about whether the copy editors are distinct personalities from the names that follow:
“Just ask Vox’s copy editors, Rob Lowe, and James Van Der Beek.”
In the sentence above, it would be easy to read it walking away with the impression that the supporting Super Troopers 2 actor had taken an unexpected position as a copy editor at Vox.
So maybe it isn’t only Neanderthals and Flat Earthers that refrain from the use of Oxford commas. Maybe there’s a reason for avoiding this additional comma after all.
But even while there are exceptions where the Oxford comma ambiguates rather than clarifies, those exceptions are few and far between. More often than not, a list would be better served by the use of that additional comma.
In informal contexts, it’s unlikely that the missing comma is going to cause much harm. Much of the argument for avoiding the added bit of punctuation is simply that it makes for more casual and fluid reading. But in any formal or legal context, it’s generally considered wise to add in Oxford’s unassuming squiggle.
Whether or not to use the added comma often hinges on the trade-off between avoiding potential confusion and keeping a sentence crisp. In contexts where clarity could be compromised, the Oxford comma is a safety net. But in everyday communication, skipping it may not result in calamities or eaten grandmas.
While using the final comma is still a decision left up to each writer, and is likely to remain a sorely debated subject in language for decades to come, one issue on which most of the world can agree is that it’s just not that important. But we readers and writers know that some wars are worth fighting.
This article was originally published on Medium.
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I, too, was not taught to use the Oxford comma. In the last few years, however, I have gotten used to using it, probably in large part because of Grammarly.