Some time ago, one of my former students requested a column on punctuation, specifically, how to use parentheses and dashes.

Forget black rhinos and the Amazon rainforest: there’s something arguably just as precious joining the endangered species list, only this time, it’s a grammatical rather than biological extinction ...

Do you know how to use a semicolon correctly? Even if you think you do, are you sure? That odd cross between a colon and a comma may be the most frequently misused and misunderstood punctuation mark ...

The age-old semicolon is dying out as Britons admit to never or rarely using the punctuation mark. In English-written 19th century literature it appeared once in every 205 words, but today it is down ...