Slash

While this Slash is pretty cool, he has nothing to do with grammar. In fact, he got the nickname from a friend's father and it just stuck. "...it was always because I was in a hurry, hustling whatever it was I was hustling at the time and never had time to sit and chat. I was always sort of in passing and he just started calling me Slash.”

The slash / serves many purposes. It is often only through context that we really understand its meaning. There are usually no spaces before or after a slash. Here is my valiant effort at trying to address some of those meanings.

It can be used as a word substitute for "or" when indicating a choice.

• Male/Female
• Yes/No
• Pass/Fail

I sometimes see it being used in an effort to make a strong connection between words.

• The Hemingway/Faulkner generation

I've also seen it used when there is conflict between two things.

• The nature/nurture debate

I quickly discovered this in university when I had to take notes quickly - abbreviations.

• w/o = without
• w/ = with
• b/w = between
• n/a = not applicable

It is often used as a substitute for the word 'per'

• 7.5 hours/day
• 100km/hour

My personal favourite - because the irony is, not many people can read it - is when it's used in phonetics. You know what they are. You see them in dictionaries right after words to show you how the words are pronounced. 

• My name is Bonnie. This is how you write it out phonetically /bɒni:/
• Slash looks like this /slæʃ/

I know I haven't addressed everything. Some other uses of the slash can be seen in poetry (line breaks), fractions (math), dates, web addresses, and emojis. I think everyone knows those.
(^o^)/

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