Punctuation is also important, but the rules are simple. End a sentence with either a period or a question mark. Put a question mark ONLY after questions that require a yes-or-no answer (like ΓÇ£Are you crazy?ΓÇ¥, although you might be inclined to give more than a yes-or-no answer to that question). Other questions
(like ΓÇ£What is the capital of South Dakota?ΓÇ¥ ) should be ended with a period.
The comma and the dash are for pauses, the comma causing a more pronounced pitch rise. Use commas to delimit clauses, dashes to delimit phrases. Use commas where they would normally appear, plus elsewhere where natural pauses occur.
Parentheses are used to delimit noun phrases: any two or more content words that stand for one object. The phrase ΓÇ£the manΓÇ¥ would not get parentheses, but
ΓÇ£the thin manΓÇ¥ would because it has two content words, and ΓÇ£the tall blond man with one black shoeΓÇ¥ would also: it is a noun phrase, albeit a long one. Please use parentheses wherever called for, because the rule for applying them is easy, and they really help MacintalkΓÇÖs pronunciation a lot.
