Ellipsis are used in the following cases:
1. To interrupt a thought so that the reader understands what would be stated or imagine:
a) He said he didn't want to, but...
b) None of this would have happened if... Do you know.
2. To indicate common hesitations in orality:
a) Then he took...he took...how to say...a beret.
b) I don't know if you will, but...but...I don't know...I think it will be great!
3. In deleted excerpts of a text:
a) (...) there is no incoherent text in itself, but text that can be incoherent in/for a given communicative situation. (...) (Ingedore Villaça – Textual coherence)
b) (...) Given the seriousness of the events, in a last gesture, Collor demanded that the Brazilian population take to the streets with their faces painted green and yellow, as a sign of support for his government. In response, several citizens, mainly students, began to go out on the streets with their faces painted. In addition to the yellow green, they used black as a sign of repudiation of the government. This movement became known as “Painted Faces”. (…) (Rainer Sousa – “The end of the Collor government”)
4. To convey more emotion and subjectivity to those who read:
a) (...) 'We are at sea... two infinities
There they close in an insane embrace,
Blue, gold, placid, sublime...
Which of the two is heaven? which ocean...
'We are in the middle of the sea.... opening the candles
In the hot panting of seas,
Brigue sailboat runs to the flower of the seas,
How the swallows graze the wave... (...)
(Ship Negreiro – Castro Alves)
Do not stop now... There's more after the advertising ;)
By Sabrina Vilarinho
Graduated in Letters
Brazil School Team
See more!
Semicolon - The sign that has neither a period nor a comma function. When to use it? Learn more here!
Punctuation marks - Grammar - Brazil School
Would you like to reference this text in a school or academic work? Look:
VILARINHO, Sabrina. "Ellipsis "; Brazil School. Available in: https://brasilescola.uol.com.br/gramatica/reticencias.htm. Accessed on June 27, 2021.
