A Cause of Ambiguity and Misunderstanding in Written Communication Incorrect Punctuation

A Cause of Ambiguity and Misunderstanding in Written Communication: Incorrect Punctuation

Project / Seminar Material
Reference ID: PS-10339-TM

DEDICATION

This research material titled “A Cause of Ambiguity and Misunderstanding in Written Communication: Incorrect Punctuation” is dedicated to God for his enabling grace, and to all computer enthusiasts who contributed to make life a pleasant experience during my research documentation.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I extend my sincere gratitude to all those who contributed to the completion of this project. Special thanks to my Supervisor (Name of your Supervisor), the Head of Department (Name of your HOD), the Lecturers in the department of English Language, Book Authors and Profound Scholars of existing or related project material on “A Cause of Ambiguity and Misunderstanding in Written Communication: Incorrect Punctuation” for their invaluable guidance, support, and expertise throughout the journey.

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ABSTRACT

Ambiguity is a linguistic phenomenon in which more than one meaning, or deep structure, may be represented by the same expression, or surface structure; the same word or similar sounding words for example can have multiple meaning. It arises from different sources; phonology, syntax and punctuation. In this task, ambiguity is the preoccupation of this task. It is a point where two sentence overlap with respect to their syntactic category.

A Cause of Ambiguity and Misunderstanding in Written Communication: Incorrect Punctuation

CHAPTER ONE

1.0 Introduction

Punctuation is one of the major aspects that contribute to meaning of any written discourse. This implies that correct the use of punctuation in written communication enhances meaning and fluency which facilitates comprehension and effective communication.

However, when punctuation marks are used incorrectly, it generally alters meaning and creates ambiguity in written discourse which leads to ineffective communication.

This research is taken to investigate how incorrect punctuation creates ambiguity and misunderstanding in written communication. This will be achieved by examining selected scripts of UG III students of Modern European Languages and Linguistics of Usmanu Danfodiyo University Sokoto, thereby evaluating the causes of ambiguity in the essays with regards to the incorrect use of punctuation.

1.1 Background To The Study

Punctuation is the use of punctuation marks within a written text to enhance its meaning or fluency or to indicate aspect of pronunciation. Punctuation is one of the most important aspects of written communications. In fact, it is the basic features of any written discourse that gives meaning to the written words. Hence, an error in punctuation can convey a completely different meaning as against the intended one, thereby, making communication incomprehensible and ambiguous.

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CHAPTER TWO

2.0 Literature Review

2.1 Introduction

This chapter focuses on the review of related literature. A literature review includes the current knowledge as well as theoretical and methodological contributions to a particular topic. It documents the state of the art with respect to the topic you are writing. It surveys the literature in the topic selected. In this research work the literature review includes the …

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