Oxford comma.

What is the Oxford comma?

The Oxford comma (also known as 'serial comma') is the comma after the penultimate item in a list of three or more items and before the conjunction.

The problem with the serial is that it could just as easily, if not more easily, create ambiguity:

''We invited the stripper, JFK, and Stalin.''

In this case, it could be thought to mean that invitations were sent to Stalin and a stripper named JFK.

When should we use the Oxford comma?

Not all writers and publishers use it, but most U.S. style guides say, ''Use it always.''

Another example which shows that a comma before 'and' may result in a lack of clarity is this sentence from the 1934 style book of the New York Herald Tribune:

''Those at the ceremony were commodore, the fleet captain, the donor of the cup, Mr. Smith, and Mr. Jones.''

With the comma, it reads as if Mr. Smith was the donor of the cup, which he was not.

In my opinion, the Oxford comma is dispensable, presumptuous and pedantic. People locked up in grammar love this kind of superfluous worries. All in all, it would look like this:

A little bit of humor:

''Who gives a fuck about an Oxford comma?''