The War for the Oxford Comma

Being an English teacher has really changed the way I look at things. I have thought more about and begun to care more about grammar in the last few weeks than I ever have in my life. It's actually pretty interesting.

At my school, some of the textbooks are American, while the others are British. For the most part this isn't a problem, other than the hilariously awkward sounding British audio CD's I have to play in class, which almost always make me laugh. Some things can be a little confusing however.

Spelling isn't usually a big deal. I always tell my students that it's ok to spell it theater or theatre, color or colour. I actually kind of prefer the "our" spelling. Certain words really bother me though, like "practise". That just looks weird. Or "realise". Why would you even spell it like that, Britain?

Then there's the whole thing I have about the phrase "at the weekend"  instead of "on the weekend". That doesn't even make sense. I had marked it wrong in a whole stack of essays before I asked Geoffrey about it. We are always having to ask him if something is British or just a mistake on the part of our students.

The worst thing though is the lack of the Oxford Comma. I know, grammatically it's ok not to use it. The UK, Australia, and other places that use British English generally forgo the Oxford Comma. I just think that it's really essential, and I have been trying to get my students to use it all year. They haven't been taught it and always ask me why I write in that second comma in their writings.

The Oxford Comma, by the way, is when you use a comma to set apart the last two items on a list. We learn it in the US, and don't think anything of it.

Here are some reasons it's important:

"I like to eat apples, ice cream and chicken curry."

The above statement makes it look like I like ice cream with curry on top of it which is just gross. That comma is important.

Here's another one that I found online to illustrate my point. Imagine someone just won a big award and was making their acceptance speech.

"I would like to thank my parents, Bill Clinton and Oprah Winfrey."

He is trying to thank four people, not two. Bill and Oprah are not his parents.

You can see why this bothers me! It's become a crusade for me and Kelsey, one of the Prathom teachers. I think the other teachers kind of find it funny how much we care about this.