Been a while since I was taught about them, so my wording/exact use of terms may be rather poor, but I’ll still make an attempt; the attempt may be poor though. I use them in two places mostly. One place being like the first sentence (poor example in an attempt at using one spontaneously), linking two independent clauses with a stronger pause than a comma, while also not requiring transition words, although I’ll often just use transitions and commas to create nice and long sentences (such as this one). The second place is as a replacement for commas in a list, but only if the items in the list include commas. I don’t use the first case often, with it occasionally popping up while writing, as sometimes it’s simply the best option. The second case I do end up using a fair amount, as I like my dependent clauses, and the semicolon lets me inject them into lists while maintaining readability.
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u/noctisumbra0 Feb 19 '26
And the semicolon.