slash

Definition:

A forward sloping line (/) that serves as a mark of punctuation.

The slash (also called a virgule) is commonly used to:

• signify alternatives (and/or)
• separate the parts of a fraction (2/3), date (1/1/2012), or Internet address (http:// . . .)
• mark line divisions in poetry quoted within running text

According to most style guides, a space should precede and follow a slash used to mark line divisions in poetry (example #2, below). In all other uses, no space should appear before or after a slash.

Etymology:

From Old French, "splinter"

Examples and Observations:

• "[T]he slash is a punctuation mark that sprouts in legal and commercial jargon ("and/or") and should not be used outside those linguistic ghettos."
  (Rene J. Cappon, The Associated Press Guide to Punctuation. Basic, 2003)



• "In 15 spare lines, from opening query ('Margaret, are you grieving / Over Goldengrove unleaving?') to final couplet, [Gerard Manley] Hopkins covers a vast amount of ground."
  (Leah Hager Cohen, "Season of Grief." The New York Times, Sep. 19, 2008)



• "This calculator-converter provides online conversion of miles per hour to km/hour (mph to km/h) and conversion km/h to mi/h (kilometers/hour to miles/hour)."
  (Calculator-Converter.com)



• "'Had there been proper coordination among the intelligence agencies, then 9/11 might well have been prevented,' Mr. [Arlen] Specter said, cataloging the intelligence failures investigated by the Sept. 11 panel."
  (Philip Shenon, "Senate Approves Intelligence Bill." The New York Times, Dec. 9, 2004)



• "The slash separates alternatives that may exist simultaneously in one person/place/thing/notion, or are offered up as possible choices. This is waffling territory at its most sublime! And why not, since this punctuation mark can't settle on one name for itself, but keeps its options open."
  (Karen Elizabeth Gordon, The New Well-Tempered Sentence: A Punctuation Handbook for the Innocent, the Eager, and the Doomed. Mariner Books, 2003)



• "The [slash] was . . . once used as a precursor to the soft hyphen, to mark end-of-line word division. Solidus is Latin for 'shilling': in Britain, the name was extended to the mark used to separate shillings from pence in pre-decimal currency: 7/6 for seven shillings and sixpence."
  (Tom McArthur, The Oxford Companion to the English Language. Oxford Univ. Press, 1992)

Also Known As: virgule, oblique, oblique stroke, diagonal, solidus, forward slash