Do you know what colon grammar is? This article will provide you with all of the information you need on a colon, including its definition, usage, example sentences, and more!
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Kevin
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December 11, 2021
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Common Questions
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What is a colon?
According to Your Dictionary, the colon is a punctuation mark like a comma, semicolon, dashes, hyphens, quotation marks, parentheses, apostrophes, the single space, question marks, brackets, a full stop, and more. It looks like two bullet points on top of one another. In AP Style, Chicago Style, the Associated Press Stylebook, and the American English Chicago Manual of Style, the use of a colon is reserved for specific circumstances and people make a common mistake misusing it. People often make the first letter or first word after a colon capital, but it should be a lower case letter.
The colon can be used for many different things. It can be used in place of a joining-word to attach two main clauses, complete sentences, or independent clauses, it can be used in Bible verses or Biblical references, to describe a ratio, to introduce a quotation, after a salutation in a business letter, to introduce lists that are fragments or an incomplete thought and more.
Many different languages also contain words that mean colon. You may notice that some of these translations of colon look and sound similar to one another. These are called cognates, which are words and phrases in different languages that likely have the same root or language of origin, causing them to sound the same. The below list of translations of colon is provided by Word Sense.
- Danish: kolon (neut.)
- Hungarian: kettőspont
- Italian: due punti (masc. pl.)
- Finnish: kaksoispiste
- Czech: dvojtečka (fem.)
- Turkish: iki nokta üst üste
- Irish: idirstad (masc.)
- Serbo-Croatian: dvotočka (fem.), dvotočje (neut.)
- Norwegian: kolon (neut.)
- Spanish: dos puntos (masc. pl.)
- Korean: 쌍점 (雙点, ssangjeom)
- Dutch: dubbelpunt (neut.)
- Russian: двоето́чие (neut.)
- Slovene: dvopičje (neut.)
- Tagalog: tutuldok
- Polish: dwukropek (m-in)
- Slovak: dvojbodka (fem.)
- Persian: دونقطه (donoqte)
- German: Doppelpunkt (masc.), Kolon (neut.)
- Galician: dous puntos (masc. pl.)
- Mandarin: 冒號, 冒号 (màohào), ：
- Bulgarian: двоето́чие (neut.)
- Arabic: نُقْطَة مُزْدَوِجَة, (dual) نُقْطَتَان (fem.)
- Asturian: dos puntos (masc. pl.)
- Interlingua: duo punctos (pl.)
- Portuguese: dois pontos (masc. pl.)
- Japanese: コロン (koron), ：
- Hebrew: נקודתיים
- Swahili: alama ya mkato
- Romanian: două puncte (n-p)
- Faroese: kolon (neut.)
- Greek: άνω και κάτω τελεία (fem.)
- Esperanto: dupunkto
- Welsh: colon (masc.)
- Indonesian: titik dua
- Chinese:
- Bashkir: ике нөктә
- Swedish: kolon (neut.)
- Scottish Gaelic: còilean (masc.), dà-phuing (fem.)
- French: deux points (masc. pl.)
- Catalan: dos punts (masc. pl.)
- Macedonian: две точки
What are examples of colons?
Colons can be used in many different contexts in the English language. Trying to use a word or grammatical technique in a sentence is one of the best ways to memorize what it is, but you can also try making flashcards or quizzes that test your knowledge. Try using this term of the day in a sentence today! Below are a couple of examples of colons that can help get you started incorporating this tool into your everyday use. Take a look at these colon examples from Your Dictionary and see how many you can identify the colon in!
- Barry wanted to know why I didn’t respond to his text about the mammal: I hadn’t received it.
- She went to great lengths to emphasize this: “Kindness never fades.”
- Diana Gabaldon says this prayer before writing: “Help me see what I need to see.”
- This house has everything I need: two bedrooms, a backyard, and a garage.
- Never forget this point: think before you speak.
- The town reminded me of my childhood vacations: both were on the beach.
- Michael said: “Play hard. Work harder.”
- You can come pick me up now: I am feeling much better.
- Here are three states that begin with M: Michigan, Mississippi, and Maine.
- I just want you to remember: two can play at that game.
- This was first said by Shakespeare: “To thine own self be true.”
- The dog trainer gave us this instruction: “Love your dog and she will love you.”
- I want to travel to these places: New York, Hawaii, and Spain.
- Mrs. Morris preaches this concept: “Second place is first loser.”
- I bought a lot of meat at the store: bacon, turkey, chicken, and tuna.
- There are two choices at this time: run away or fight.
- He wanted to see three cities in Italy: Rome, Florence, and Venice
- We knew who would win the game: the Eagles
- He cares for no one: he is the epitome of selfish.
- The world is a stage: play your role well.
- Claire helped Jamie see his fate: “You’re never going to win the Battle of Culloden.”
- I need these to bake the cake: sugar, butter flour.
- I have several favorite genres of movies: drama, science fiction, and mystery.
What are other literary techniques and devices?
There are many different literary and grammatical techniques and devices that you might see when you are reading prose or poetry. It is important to recognize these terms because they are always used for some purpose. Knowing these devices can help readers understand the author’s deeper meaning and why they are using such a device. Take a look at the below list of grammatical devices from OED and see how many you know! Then try researching ones that are unfamiliar to you.
- genitive
- declarative
- demonstrative
- first person
- third-person
- filler
- clause
- prepositional phrase
- cognate object
- proper noun | proper name
- parasynthetic
- nominative
- main clause
- personal pronoun
- intransitive
- appositive
- dual
- definite article
- prepositional passive
- dative
- phrasal verb
- morpheme
- postmodify | postmodifier
- impersonal (impers.)
- mass noun
- present tense
- transitive
- inflection | inflected | inflectional
- compound | compounding
- interjection
- that-clause
- singular
- conditional
- stem
- gender
- number
- ellipsis | elliptical
- modal verb | modal auxiliary verb | modal auxiliary
- object | direct object | indirect object
- nominal relative | nominal relative clause
- present participle
- adjective
- verbal noun
- construction
- active
- participle | past participle | present participle
- preposition (prep.)
- prefix
- attributive
- possessive pronoun
- non-referential
- agent noun
- modify | modifier
- cataphoric
- unmarked genitive
- perfect
- prepositional object
- finite
- copular verb | copula
- indicative
- subjunctive
- past participle
- absolute (absol.)
- plural
- noun (n.)
- collocation | collocate
- simple
- special use
- quasi-
- main verb
- comparative
- pleonasm | pleonastic
- instrumental
- neuter
- conjunction (conj.)
- to-infinitive
- construed (const., constr.)
- indirect speech
- possessive
- parenthetical | parenthetically
- tense
- article
- complementary
- person
- auxiliary verb | auxiliary
- periphrasis | periphrastic
- anaphoric
- relative
- possessive adjective
- causative
- pronoun (pron.)
- case
- mood
- pro-form
- direct object
- part of speech
- infinitive
- progressive
- positive
- adverb (adv.)
- vocative
- participial adjective
- superlative
- antecedent
- subject
- gerund
- locative
- imperative (imper.)
- direct question
- phrase (phr.)
- objective
- similative
- optative
- indirect question
- verb (v.)
- subjective
- base form
- element
- non-finite
- sentence adverb |sentence adverbial
- accusative
- anticipatory
- masculine
- bare infinitive
- premodify | premodifier
- agree | agreement
- noun phrase
- predicative
- indefinite
- interrogative
- double object
- indirect passive
- protasis
- combination
- indirect object
- passive
- apposition
- reflexive
- determiner
- count noun
- passive infinitive
- apodosis and protasis
- zero
- feminine
- second person
- intensifier
- combining form (comb. form)
- abstract
- collective noun
- past tense
- concrete
- head
- common noun
- exclamation mark
- subordinate clause
- complement
- direct speech
- adverbial | adverbially
Overall, a colon can be used for many different things in English grammar.
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