At the end of a sentence, it’s called a period.
Between numbers, it’s called point.
On the internet, it’s called dot.
(If you’re in England, the one at the end of a sentence is also called full stop. This is not common in Canada.)
Tag Archives: Punctuation
Uncommon Punctuation Names
(these are called parentheses or brackets)
[these are called square brackets]
{these are called curly brackets}
/ is slash
\ is backslash
~ is tilde
# is number sign or pound
& is ampersand
is asterisk
| is pipe
– is dash or hyphen
_ is underscore
The Period
People often don’t know that English has three (or four) names for this punctuation mark. If you use the wrong one, Canadians will understand you, but you will sound strange.
At the end of sentence, it is called a period, or a full stop in England.
In mathematics, it is called a point. For 3.14, say “Three point one four.”
On the internet, we say dot. For google.ca, say “google dot sea eh.”
Dave's English Classes 