What is a colon used for? To introduce a formal business message; to separate the hour from the minutes in time notations; to join two independent clauses when they are joined by an independent marker followed by a comma; to emphasize a list; to introduce all quotes To introduce a list, quote, or idea directly following an independent clause; to introduce e-mail messages; to separate the hour from the minutes in time notations; to join one independent clause and one dependent clause To introduce a formal business message; to separate the hour from the minutes in time notations; to join two independent clauses when you want to emphasize the second clause; to introduce a list, quote, or idea directly following an independent clause