Where do you want it? From behind or upfront?

[Mammon]

This is a question that's been bothering me for a while. The comma. The but. Comma goes where?

I used to think it was like this -- ", but" HOWEVER my last english professor point it out to me and said it was like this "but,"

The comma doesn't go in the backdoor, it's unnatural she told me. They go in front. The comma is a pause so it's supposed to happen after the but is revealed in the sentence. I said the pause could happen before the but. She was in charge of my grades and she did have a grade so, I settled.

I put the comma in the front but, I wonder if thats correct, I see people here doing it the other way.

[DavidOdden]

The comma is placed where you would pause in the middle of a sentence to indicate conceptual grouping. The comma is placed where you would pause in the middle of a sentence, to indicate conceptual grouping. The comma is placed where you would pause, in the middle of a sentence, to indicate conceptual grouping. Notice how, stupid it sounds when, you read this particular, sentence with pauses where the commas, are. Admittedly, you have to have some oratorical skills for the read-aloud test to work, but I think that's the best test for comma positioning.

You could read this sentence without a comma but it's better with one. You could read this sentence without a comma, but it's better with one. You could read this sentence without a comma but, this option sux. You could read this sentence without a comma, but, sometimes you should consider having two. It has to do with how long the second clause is -- the second clause should be fairly long if you're gonna put a comma after your "but", and then it is really obligatory to put one before the first but.

As for the sexual innuendos about backdoor buts, sheesh, these English professors.

[avampirist]

I'm no authority on punctuation, because my use of grammar isn't excellent, but I don't remember the last time I saw a comma used after the word "But".

"My use of grammar isn't excellent but, I don't think your teacher is correct."

Similarly, you can't use a comma after "and". " I went to the park and, walked my dog."

Nobody ever says "Walked my dog". That's a sentence fragment. Nobody uses a conjunction

until they have a clause to join to another clause. Right? That's a bad example, because the sentence is so short you don't need a comma, but perhaps you know hwat I mean.

"I put the comma in the front but, I wonder if thats correct." Which sentence sounds more correct? I'll let you decide.

"I put the comma in the front but"

"But I wonder if that's correct."

"But" and "and" are conjunctions. They're used to connect two "independent clauses"? I don't quite remember the terminology, so someone correct me if I'm wrong. Using the comma in that manner breaks the connection.

Edited November 13, 2007 by avampirist

[-archimedes-]

This is a question that's been bothering me for a while. The comma. The but. Comma goes where?

I used to think it was like this -- ", but" HOWEVER my last english professor point it out to me and said it was like this "but,"

The comma doesn't go in the backdoor, it's unnatural she told me. They go in front. The comma is a pause so it's supposed to happen after the but is revealed in the sentence. I said the pause could happen before the but. She was in charge of my grades and she did have a grade so, I settled.

I put the comma in the front but, I wonder if thats correct, I see people here doing it the other way.

The utilization of sexual innuendo by your English teacher as a vehicle of insuring you're understanding of the grammatical information that she was relaying to you aside (kudos for the witty teacher though), the placement of the punctuation mark, comma, in relation to the word but is all dependent upon the context it which it is being used in a sentence that determines whether it's inflection is as a conjunction, preposition, adverb, noun, or idiom...it's not what you say, but how you say it.