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I do find these troubling. Is my comma usage correct around "however" and "whereas"?

One has to admit, however, that the situations are not exactly the same. Israel is a stable industrial democarcy, whereas, Palestine is an occupied terrority that is under siege. We can hardly expect equal standards of justice.

My Little Brown Handbook leaves some confusion on this rather i'm not sure which section partains to it.

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[nq:1]I do find these troubling. Is my comma usage correct around "however" and "whereas"? One has to admit, however, that ... industrial democarcy, whereas, Palestine is an occupied terrority that is under siege. We can hardly expect equal standards of justice.[/nq]
I thought with all my years studying and teaching political science that I had a good grasp of forms of governance. I have a gap, it seems. What, I wonder, is a 'democarcy'? And is it normal to label a group whose methods we disagree with as a 'terrority'?
I would leave out the comma after 'whereas.' Well, that's not quite true: I would use ', while' rather than ', whereas,'. 'Whereas' is relatively unused outside of legal documents.
Here are the citations of this use of 'whereas' from the OED. The examples from 1535, 1631, and 1882 are the closest to your use. Note that only the 1849 from Bronte has a comma following 'whereas,' and that has some phrase omitted between 'Whereas' (initial word in the sentence) and the comma.

1535 Coverdale 2 Esdras vii. 5 There are layed vp for vs dwellynges ofhealth & fredome, where as we haue lyued euell.

1542 Udall Erasm. Apoph. 7 This knaue, wheras he is the greattestglutton .. that maye bee, yet is he the moste idle lubber.
1591 Shakes. 1 Hen. VI, ii. v. 76, I deriued am From Lionel Duke ofClarence ..; whereas hee, From Iohn of Gaunt doth bring his Pedigree.

1631 Weever Anc. Funeral Mon. 520 Hee might haue worne the Diadem manyyeares, whereas he bare the title of King no longer than two moneths.

1749 Fielding Tom Jones x. iii, Whereas he had received a veryhandsome fortune with his wife, he had now spent every penny of it.

1849 C. Brontë Shirley xxvi, ?Yet, they are great whiskered fellows,six feet high each.? ?Whereas .., Harry, you will never be anything more than a little pale lameter.?

1882 Besant All Sorts xxiv, I brought him up in ignorance of hisfather, whom he had always imagined to be a gentleman; whereas he was only a sergeant in a Line regiment.

1892 Photogr. Ann. II. 519 Whereas a pinhole has no focus, every lenshas a focus.

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The commas around "however" are correct - they are parenthetical, and so the rest of the sentence runs smoothly without them ("One has to admit that the situations . . . ."). The commas around "whereas" are incorrect because the sentence does not run smoothly without them ("Israel is a stable industrial democracy Palestine is an occupied territory . . . ."). A comma is needed after "democracy".
Although commas aren't necessarily about "pauses" - some would say not at all - a good test of paired commas is to read sentences aloud, in my opinion.

Peasemarch.

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[nq:1]I do find these troubling. Is my comma usage correct around "however" and "whereas"? One has to admit, however, ... industrial democarcy, whereas, Palestine is an occupied terrority that is under siege. We can hardly expect equal standards of justice.[/nq]
However - OK.
whereas - omit the fomma following.

Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/7734/stevesig.htm
E-mail - see web page, or parse: shayes at dunelm full stop org full stop uk

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[nq:2]I do find these troubling. Is my comma usage correct ... under siege. We can hardly expect equal standards of justice.[/nq]
[nq:1]However - OK. whereas - omit the fomma following.[/nq]
Funny, I no fee fomma.

dg (domain=ccwebster)

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[nq:1]The commas around "however" are correct - they are parenthetical, andso the rest of the sentence runs smoothly without them ... them ("Israel is a stableindustrial democracy Palestine is an occupied territory . . . ."). A comma isneeded after "democracy".[/nq]
So generally speaking you would comma off anything that is parenthetical? Word or word group? So if "whereas" was part of a parenthetical phrase it could be comma'd off?

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You don't have to use commas at all, if there's no discontinuity of thought ("You can't blame the vol-au-vent shortage exclusively or even chiefly on global warming").
(Parentheses can - obviously - also be marked by dashes or brackets.)
[nq:1]So if "whereas" was part of a parenthetical phrase it could be comma'd off?[/nq]
It could ("Anthony set out with high hopes, whereas Nigel was cynical from the start, but neither of them could have foreseen capture by Barbary pirates five minutes into their canoe expedition to locate the source of the Evenlode"); it isn't often part of one, though.
If "whereas" is comma'd off on its own, it is usually because, as somebody said earlier in the thread, other structures intervene ("Stefanie became a Carmelite nun, whereas, she later discovered, her sister Jennifer ended up farming ostriches in Chipping Camden").
Peasemarch.

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Am I also right in understandint that the em dash is used in the sam way ?
Rob Findlay

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Gack! I shouldn't post after 5pm.
Let me try again.
Am I also right in understanding that the em dash is used in the same way?
Rob Findlay

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