ShmoopTube

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Here’s your Shmoop du jour, brought to you by unsung genius, Makoto Hagiwara.

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Sign our petition to make his birthday a national holiday.

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How would you correct this underlined segment from the passage, if at all?

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man, named Makoto Hagiwara, in 1914, in San Francisco.?

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And here are the potential answers...

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Once again, we’re being asked to determine what’s essential and what’s

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nonessential in a sentence.

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The rule of thumb is that nonessential elements should be set apart by commas...

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While essential elements should let it fly with no punctuation at all.

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Choice (A) is definitely wrong.

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It goes so crazy with the commas that it’s hard to tell what the writer thinks is essential

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or nonessential. Option (B), on the other hand, sets the phrase

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“named Makoto Hagiwara in 1914” apart with commas.

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There’s no way this is correct because the main point of this sentence is to tell us

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Makoto’s name.

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The year in which he invented fortune cookies also seems probably pretty important.

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We find a similar mistake in choice (C), which only sets the name “Makoto Hagiwara” apart.

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Again, this guy’s name is totally essential to the sentence.

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Man, why is everybody hatin’ on Makoto? That does it; we’re officially starting

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the Makoto Hagiwara fan club.

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The best answer is (D). The correct response is to place no punctuation in this sentence.

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All of the elements of the clause that begins with "Japanese man named…" are essential—

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we need to know the name, the year, and the place. Therefore, they should not be set off from

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the body of the sentence by commas.

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We believe fortune cookie history is essential knowledge for all Americans

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and should be taught in every school across the land.

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