by Jennie Ruby
There are several ways to give an enumerated (numbered) list in sentence form. One way is to put the number (not the number word) in parentheses, like this:
- I came up with three reasons: (1) this is my first reason, (2) this is my second reason, and (3) this is my third reason.
Notice that the numbers are inside a pair of parentheses. It is not considered correct to use just one parenthesis after the number. If the introduction of the reasons is not a complete sentence, do not use a colon to introduce the list. Instead, do this:
- My reasons are (1) this is my first reason, (2) this is my second reason, and (3) this is my third reason.
If the text of any of the reasons contains a comma, then you use semicolons between the items-but if that happens, you should consider making it a vertical list, like this:
I came up with three reasons:
- This is my first reason, which contains a comma.
- This is my second reason.
- This is my third reason.
Another way to list reasons would be in separate sentences, using the ordinal forms of the number words, like this:
- I came up with three reasons. First, this is my first reason. Second, this is my second reason. Third, this is my third reason.
Combining these into one big sentence with semicolons is not recommended, because if you are putting an enumerated list into one sentence, you use the numbers in parentheses as in my first example.
You can, of course, choose to use letters instead of numbers in all but the last situation.
About the Author: Jennie Ruby is a veteran IconLogic trainer and author with titles such as "Essentials of Access 2000" and "Editing with MS Word 2003 and Adobe Acrobat 7" to her credit. Jennie specializes in electronic editing. At the American Psychological Association, she was manager of electronic publishing and manager of technical editing and journal production. Jennie has an M.A. from George Washington University and is a Certified Technical Trainer (Chauncey Group). She is a publishing professional with 20 years of experience in writing, editing and desktop publishing.
Want help with a grammar issue? Email us your troubles and we'll turn Jennie loose!
what if there is two 3rd reasons that euqal the same, how do you list it
1. abc = 8
2. cbs = 7
3. nbc = 6
fox = 6
Posted by: robert | December 21, 2012 at 12:46 PM