Letters and E-mails: Comma, Colon or Dash? ?

Question

I've been perplexed recently by the punctuational diversity in e-mail's I have received.

I have always written letters or e-mails by first using the individuals name followed by a comma. I have, however, seen many e-mails come my way that now use either a dash or a semi-colon after the name of the individual being addressed (in this case, me).

What is with this? Is this new? Are there grammar rules for this?

Answer 1

For many years the common way to address someone in a letter was to write something like this:

Dear Mr. Johnson, (comma)  However, back when I was in seventh grade already (1993) that was changed and now the proper way to address someone in a letter is to write something like this:

Dear Mr. Johnson: (colon)  This is because after you address the person, you are then going to list the body of information  and in English you always use a colon before writing a list of info.

Answer 2

Traditionally, the usage in letters was that the salutation was followed by a colon (':', not a semi-colon) in a business letter; for example,

Dear Mr Jones:

The salutation was followed by a comma in a personal letter:



Dear Bob,

This was always just a punctuation convention; it has nothing to do with grammar.  If I were writing a formal communication, I'd probably follow the convention.  For informal notes, or E-mail, use what you like.