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Jigneshbharati Posted 10 years ago
Grammar

Use of comma" ,"and semi colon" ;"

Deductions from your salary may include, but are not limited to; any overpayment of wages or expenses; any outstanding loans or advances; housing or relocation expenses; training costs; costs of repairing any deliberate damage or loss to the Trust’s property caused by you (including recovery); excess holiday pay; and any other monies owed by you to the Trust.
Please explain to me the use of "," and ";" here to make this long sentence.
How many clauses are here? Or they are all phrases?
Thanks
  

Top answer

The first semicolon is wrong and should be a colon. The items separated by the semicolons are all noun phrases. There are some embedded relative clauses: "(that has been) caused by you", "(that are) owed by you".

— GPY

  • The first semicolon is wrong and should be a colon.
  • The items separated by the semicolons are all noun phrases.
  • There are some embedded relative clauses: "(that has been) caused by you", "(that are) owed by you".
  • The author has chosen to separate the listed items with semicolons rather than commas because of their length and complexity.
  • This is done for ease of reading.
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1 Answers
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The first semicolon is wrong and should be a colon.

The items separated by the semicolons are all noun phrases. There are some embedded relative clauses: "(that has been) caused by you", "(that are) owed by you".

The author has chosen to separate the listed items with semicolons rather than commas because of their length and complexity. This is done for ease of reading.
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