PUNCTUATION

Brackets

Brackets are used (always in pairs) to set aside ADDITIONAL INFORMATION.

My brother Peter (the younger one) spent a year in Australia.

Whenever she visits (usually on Fridays) it is like a ray of sunshine.

To achieve the same effect, you could use a pair of commas or a pair of dashes.  Brackets are a little "stronger" than either of the alternatives.

You should avoid using brackets within brackets (although it is technically acceptable) as it makes the sentence rather unwieldy.  When you really cannot avoid doing so, you should use a different style of brackets to ensure that your meaning is clear.

My sister Kate (who you met at "Shady's" [the nightclub in the High Street] last week) would like to see you again.

Introduction - Capital letters - Full stops - Question Marks - Exclamation marks - Abbreviations - Contractions - Commas - Speech marks (Quotation marks - Inverted comas) - Possessive apostrophes - Colons - Semi-colons - Brackets - Hyphens - Dashes - Obliques (slashes)