Talk:Run-on sentence

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Can someone also elaborate why all old-style writing in English from the last century and beyond, consists entirely of run-on sentences, to the point where you get confused as to what the hell they are talking about??? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.27.157.26 (talk) 16:14, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

Splice

That's a comma splice, not a run-on sentence. Chuck 19:12, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

Cool, but where'd you find this? Fix it yourself, or tell us so we can harass the author fix it ourselves. --M1ss1ontomars2k4 | T | C | @ 02:11, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Someone else had added it to this article as an example of a run-on sentence. I removed it, since it's not a run-on sentence, but moved it here so I could explain why I was removing it. My explanation for the change lacks context without the deleted sentence itself. Chuck 18:52, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Comma splices are a form (the most common form, in fact) -- that is, a subset -- of run-on sentences. To separate them as totally distinct is incorrect: The term "comma splice" simply makes the KIND of run-on more precise. But grammarians teach from the very early grades of elementary school that a comma splice is a run-on setence. In fact, I doubt if many students anywhere know what a comma splice is, but they have all been taught what a run-on is (with the comma). Softlavender (talk) 07:03, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Some grammarians teach this, while others define run-on sentence to exclude comma splices. Chuck (talk) 21:50, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Removed text

I took the run-on sentence out of the intro paragraph. I'm sure it's meant to be witty and all, but this is an encyclopedia and we have to maintain some kind proper level of writing. Moreover, that kind of thing is typically used *verbally* by grammar teachers. It is more effective that way because they can just keep talking and talking until the pupils "get" that the sentence is running too long. Here, it just falls flat. There's been a bit of back-and-forth with this kind of thing, with huge run-on sentences getting trimmed, then getting replaced, etc. I hope we can avoid that kind of thing in the future. Matt Deres 20:08, 21 December 2006 (UTC) vvvvvvvvvvvvv — Preceding unsigned comment added by 131.179.60.181 (talk) 03:51, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

Also

isn't a runon sentence also when you put in multiple conjunctions without commas? "We're going to the store and eating pies and getting rich thereby" or something.

No. I would only classify that sentence as awkward or inelegant, not as a run-on. Matt Deres (talk) 13:32, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Heads out of ***es

What the hell does this mean? How un-Wikipedian do we want this article to be?

"A properly constructed sentence can be extended almost indefinitely. However, writing such an extended sentence is poor writing style and should be avoided."

How is that? Erroneous. Aside from lacking citation, they give no context at all, and they seem not to understand rhetoric at all, its power and usage in virtually every aspect of communication.

Hyphens

Please include some examples of sentences (both incorrect and correct) that use hyphens to separate the clauses. Thanks! SharkD (talk) 17:56, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Cite does not support assertion

Under "examples," we read, "A comma splice, which is considered a run-on sentence in English by nearly all usage experts." with this page given as a citation, but that page says absolutely nothing about whether a comma splice is considered a run-on sentence by anyone, let alone "nearly all usage experts." If anyone has a citation which actually supports the statement being made, please add it. Chuck (talk) 16:26, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

"Linguistics" section unnecessary

The single sentence within the "Linguistics" section doesn't add any information, and should be removed.

First of all, punctuation isn't part of Linguistics, but of Epigraphy.

Second, its list is something I'd call a "historical tautology": no script could have had the equivalent of a run-on sentence until punctuation was invented within the history of that script. Note that it's "script" NOT "language": this is exactly why punctuation isn't within the scope of Linguistics. (Well, one may perhaps allow the exception of English's pain-in-the-tokhis possessive apostrophe, and its it's its' its's confusion!)

Leaving this section in place would open the door for needless inclusion of a laundry-list of almost every script used any time before c. 400 CE, and many thereafter. Even Latin and Greek were not written using punctuation, much less spaces between words, until the early Middle Ages. With Chinese, (except for works produced by Western missionaries) punctuation wasn't used regularly in print until the late 19th century--so it's not just Classical Chinese that needs to be listed.--Polemyx (talk) 15:05, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

Questioning lede

"A run-on is a sentence". Really? What is described here is when more than one sentence has been written without proper punctuation between them. A sentence without conjunctions really has only one independent verb phrase. From a British perspective, where this seems rarer, it would merely be seen as incorrect punctuation between sentences. So "A run-on is an error in punctuation where sentences are not properly separated by full stops or semicolons, and may have no intervening punctuation at all.". Should it be merged with Comma splice, which seems the better article? --Cedders^tk 19:25, 22 April 2016 (UTC)