parenthesis

Pronunciation

• IPA ^(key): /pəˈrɛnθəsɪs/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

Noun

Singular parenthesis

Plural parentheses

Parentheses

1. (countable) A parenthesis is a symbol that looks like ( or ). A person may see parentheses when reading books. Most of the time, they are not used to tell the main story, but gives the reader extra information so they can understand.

   Billy and Bob wrote their papers (Billy wrote about karate, and Bob wrote about dogs).

   *The quote inside the parentheses, "Billy wrote about karate, and Bob wrote about dogs", is put inside parentheses because it would be a run-on sentence if there were no parentheses.

   *You can also use commas as parentheses, but you need to write the sentence differently.

   Billy, who wrote about karate, and Bob, who wrote about dogs, wrote their papers.

Related words

• (
• )