Brackets

Brackets

() Round Brackets

Brackets add in extra information and the way to check if they are correct is to see if the sentence makes sense without what is written inside them, eg.

I went for dinner (fish and chips with ketchup) and then to the cinema.

Here you can see that the brackets simply add more information and the sentence still makes sense without the bracketed information;

I went for dinner and then to the cinema.

[] Square Brackets

Square brackets are used to add in information that the original author may have omitted, eg.

For example, if referring to someone's statement "I hate to do the vacuuming", one could write: She "hate[s] to do the vacuuming".