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Topic : Punctuation in a list Let's say I have a document with a list like this: aaaa bbbb cccc dddd Should I put nothing, a semicolon, a full stop or what at the end of each line? This is for - selfpublishingguru.com

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Let's say I have a document with a list like this:

aaaa
bbbb
cccc
dddd

Should I put nothing, a semicolon, a full stop or what at the end of each line? This is for an academic paper. We don't have a specific style guide we're supposed to follow.

I found some information on the Internet and apparently: if there is no full stop within an item (as in 2nd and 3rd item in the list above), the item is closed by a semicolon, otherwise by a full stop (as in the 1st item in the list above).

Is this correct?

Is this applicable to a mixed (full stop within some item, no full stop within some other time) list?


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This is a stylistic choice. I would never use a comma or semicolon at the end of a list item. I would use a period/full stop only if the item is a full sentence. To wit:

Star Trek is known for breaking new ground on television in several ways:
• Kirk and Uhura's kiss in "Plato's Stepchildren" was the first interracial kiss on broadcast TV.
• Chekov (a Russian) and Uhura (a black woman) as bridge officers
• An alien as the first officer (and in the pilot, a woman as the first officer)
• In later series, black and female captains, and a Klingon bridge officer
• Apocryphally, Lt. Malcolm Reed was intended to be gay, which would have made all the security officers contravene the hulking testosterone-soaked bruiser stereotype (Yar, a wasp-waisted woman; Worf, the oddly subdued Klingon; Odo, the thoughtful shapeshifter; Tuvok, a Vulcan; and Reed, a slender gay man).


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