영어 교육적 관점에서 본 구두점의 의미와 문법적 역할

The Meaning and Grammatical Role of English Punctuation:From a Pedagogical Perspective

The current national curriculum requires secondary-school students to acquire competence in the use of English punctuation. In reality, however, punctuation is virtually ignored in almost every English classroom in Korea. In this paper I demonstrate that punctuation marks can carry important semantic information and that they can also affect grammaticality of sentences. This will show that the competence in English punctuation is needed for better reading as much as for better writing. Based on this, I argue that punctuation should be an essential part of English education. In the course of the discussion I suggest ways to introduce punctuation more seriously into the English education in Korea.