The Comma Splice

A comma splice is what happens when you jam two sentences — or independent clauses — together, by adding a comma in between.

Examples

  • I’m going to see the dentist today, I think he’s quite a hottie.
  • I can see clearly now, the rain is gone.

It’s a subtle style error, which is why it’s a fairly common one. I’ve seen this on signboards, on corporate websites, and even in the news. I’m guessing this mistake crops up because people are writing what they “hear” – except what they’re “hearing” isn’t a comma joining both sentences or clauses, but a semicolon.

Hence

  • I’m going to see the dentist; I think he’s quite a hottie.
  • I can see clearly now; the rain is gone.

The fix? When in doubt, remember these three rules when it comes to joining independent sentences.

You could

  • leave them as separate sentences ( I’m going to the dentist now. I think he’s quite a hottie.)
  • join them with a semicolon (I’m going to the dentist now; I think he’s quite a hottie.)
  • join them with a comma, followed by a joining word (conjunction). Conjunctions are words like “but”, “because”, and “therefore”. (I’m going to the dentist now, because I think he’s quite a hottie.)

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