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6.5.5 Moving by S-Expression

Command	Key Binding	Purpose
forward-sexp	‘C-M-f’	Move forward by sexp
backward-sexp	‘C-M-b’	Move backward by sexp
	‘<ESC> C-d’
up-list		Move forward out of one level of parentheses
backward-up-list	‘C-M-u’	Move up out of a list
down-list	‘C-M-d’	Move down into list
		just like ‘up-list’, but with a negated argument
forward-list	‘C-M=n’	Move forward to next list ‘(..)’
backward-list	‘C-M=p’	Move backward to previous list

‘sexp’

is a Lisp term that covers a wide range of commands that operate on balanced expressions.

balanced expressions

can span multiple lines; can consist of:

strings

are balanced expressions that begin and end with ‘"’ or ‘'’.

brackets

are balanced expressions that have defined open and close characters:

• ‘[ ]’
• ‘( )’
• ‘{ }’
• ‘< >’