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EL1 2
ANSWERS: 4
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I saw this question a while back but didn't have any strong feelings for it, so I left it alone. But now I do. I took a typing test a few days ago. Although I'm a fast hunt-and-pecker (insert cheap laugh here), I can't type without looking at my hands. The test involved typing a paragraph that was shown on the screen. My method is to read and comprehend about seven words, then transfer my gaze to the keyboard and type. One sentence in the test had a series without an Oxford comma, but I inserted it as I stared at the keyboard, and the test recognized it as a mistake. So now I am all for the Oxford comma. I'm pro-OC.
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In my opinion it is incorrect. The conjunction 'and' is a link between clauses or items in a list, as with the comma. You do not have them next to each other in any circunstance because there is not clause nor item to link between them, making one of the redundant.
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I am used to it, so it looks normal to me to have the comma before the conjunction. I think it helps to deliniate the group of items.
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I usually tend to think it is superfluous, except in long lists or to separate out complex clauses. Where lists are short and consist of single words, it is just a waste of a character. I don't feel strongly about it though.
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