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Is there a word describing a sentence whose meaning is changed by moving the punctuation? For example,

Let’s eat, Mommy!

and

Let’s eat Mommy!

MetaEd
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Kathleen Land
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    If you'll notice, when you close your eyes, you can still hear the difference. It's a difference in pronunciation, not punctuation. Punctuation is just a brain-damaged part of Modern English spelling, which -- as you may have noticed -- doesn't represent Modern English very well. – John Lawler Jan 09 '13 at 01:51
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    @John, yes, but, alas, nowadays teenagers don't realize how it is dangerous to practice punctuation in language usage. –  Jan 09 '13 at 02:02
  • For the written language, which you can hear if you read it silently or aloud to yourself, not only is there a difference in pronunciation, but there is a difference in what's called writing mechanics: punctuation is one aspect of writing mechanics. There's no term to describe what you're asking about. It's simply called "changing the meaning by changing the punctuation" or, in this particular case, "adding a comma that wasn't there before", not "moving a comma that wasn't there before". –  Jan 09 '13 at 02:08
  • this usually falls under syntactic (or structural) ambiguity, even though as @JohnLawler points out there is a difference in pronunciation. –  Jan 09 '13 at 02:15
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    @Carlo_R.: To borrow and adapt a slogan from the NRA, "Punctuation doesn't kill language - bad writers do!". – FumbleFingers Jan 09 '13 at 02:17
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    I don't know the technical name for this phenomenon, but I've heard the phenomenon alluded to as "eats shoots and leaves", which is the title of a book that addresses this topic. Also related: this classic ELU answer. – J.R. Jan 09 '13 at 02:21
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    Now that jlovegren has introduced the term "syntactic (or structural) ambiguity", a one-word term for adding the comma (in this case in which the first version is macabre) does suggest itself: clarification. The only times when this kind of structural ambiguity is a problem for the spoken language are when the speaker is carefully pronouncing each word without regard to its function and the required stress and intonation pattern for the sentence, and when a poor text-to-speech reader is rendering text into improperly stressed and intoned mechanical speech. –  Jan 09 '13 at 02:46
  • @FumbleFingers: I think you need to aim higher. – Robusto Jan 09 '13 at 02:56
  • That's got to be either Words don't kill language, writers do or Writers don't kill language, words do or Writers don't kill language, too many words at one time in a single phrase or clause or sentence or paragraph do or Writers don't kill language, clichés do. –  Jan 09 '13 at 03:00
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    @Robusto: You mean we should go gunning for the language mavens and copy editors? Or shall we go straight to the top and blame it all on Murdoch and his downmarket newspapers? – FumbleFingers Jan 09 '13 at 03:10
  • Commas don't kill people; they only punctuate them. Note all this metaphoric violence stirred up by commas. Figments of the fictive imagination, commas. Pay attention to the pronunciation. Then reproduce the intonation by any means you can. Including commas, if you need them; and don't forget the semicolons. – John Lawler Jan 09 '13 at 17:14

1 Answers1

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According to the Wikipedia page for Eats, Shoots & Leaves, such ambiguous constructions are examples of amphiboly or amphibology (which come from the Greek word for ambiguity).

coleopterist
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