A question for punctuation experts

Parent Cafe
1

<p>I am noticing among my college students an increased tendency to put punctuation (a comma or period) outside of a quotation mark. For example:</p>

<p>. . . the economy as a whole “wins”, while the specialized industry . . . </p>

<p>I have always thought that the punctuation should go inside the quotation mark (so . . . the economy as a whole “wins,” while the specialed industry . . .). I don’t correct this in my students’ papers, but I am wondering now if there even is a rule about this at all.</p>

<p>Anyone?</p>

2

<p>Inside the quotation mark is “American,” (guess I just identified my origin!) and outside is “British.” Here’s an article on the debate: [Logical</a> punctuation: Should we start placing commas outside quotation marks? - Slate Magazine](<a href=“http://www.slate.com/articles/life/the_good_word/2011/05/the_rise_of_logical_punctuation.html]Logical”>Logical punctuation: Should we start placing commas outside quotation marks?)</p>

3

<p>According to the Little, Brown Handbook, commas and period go inside the quotation marks UNLESS a parenthetical source citation immediately follows the quotation. Then the punctuation should be placed after the citation. </p>

<p>Colons and semicolons go outside the quotation marks. </p>

<p>When punctuation, like a question or exclamation mark, applies only to the larger sentence (and not to the quotation), it is placed outside the quotation marks.</p>

4

<p>AP style would put the comma inside the quotation marks in your example. Agree with ordinary lives. In case last bit isn’t clear:</p>

<p>Have you seen my copy of “Where’s Waldo?” <---- QM is part of the book name</p>

<p>Have you seen my copy of “Wuthering Heights”? <---- QM isn’t part of the title.</p>

5

<p>According to my kids…(since I learned the inside quote mark rule)…the
punctuation outside the quote marks is because of computers. It has to do with the spacing or something and more a product of aesthetics and became the accepted norm while in high school. I’m not arguing either side…just passing the info along.
You don’t get two spaces after typing a sentence anymore either.</p>

6

<p>Okay, I don’t see any difference as of now when I type…but I KNOW my kids told me I was “old school” and WHY when I questioned this very thing years ago. Such is life.</p>

7

<p>I am an American, but in many cases, I think the British system makes more sense.</p>

8

<p>In AP style, you never got two spaces. It has to do with newspaper spacing and getting the most out of any given page. All those spaces add up!</p>

9

<p>I put the comma outside the quotation mark. Why? Because I think the so-called rule is stupid: saying “this,” inserting a clause, is better than saying “this”, inserting a clause, for what reason? None. It’s just because. The rule should be that quote marks go inside when that is useful for clarity and outside when that is useful for clarity. </p>

<p>This kind of rule seems to be related to typesetting rules and nothing more.</p>

<p>As a kick, I looked up some grammar pages to show the issue. Here are examples:</p>

<ol>
<li>I got three “Bs” and an “A”. Punctuation outside.</li>
<li>The poet refers to the graveyard as “dismal,” “heartbreaking,” “sleeping,” and “fat.” Punctuation inside. Why? No reason. Just do it that way. Why is the “A” different from “fat”? No explanation.</li>
<li>The man said, “Stay away”; I backed away carefully. So some punctuation generally goes outside anyway.</li>
</ol>

<p>So you have to think about whether a reference requires the punctuation inside or outside except when the rule is it generally is outside and then you have to think about whether it belongs inside. </p>

<p>These kind of rules are idiotic. If you read old work, you see punctuation usage changes dramatically with time. Commas used to be, so common, it was obvious they were, for pauses in reading aloud. They were, sometimes, also, decorative in typesetting. That is one reason why the comma in the 2nd Amendment is so humorous: we try to read it as it was meant in an era when people tossed commas, about, like, candy. And now the trend is to remove as many commas possible so “the dog, the pig, and the cow” is now “the dog, the pig and the cow” and sentences that used to contain appositives like this no longer get commas. That last part might be “sentences that used to contain appositives, like this, no longer get commas”. And note I put the quotes inside the period. Why? Because the quote is within the sentence and isn’t the sentence itself. What if the sentence continued but I lopped off words. Putting the quotes outside the period would indicate the sentence was complete, which would be misleading, while putting the period outside shows that is the end of the quote itself.</p>

10

<p>Gouf78, I have been arguing for the 2 spaces after the period with my kids for years. I thought I was the only one who learned to do that!</p>

<p>Sent from my SGH-T989 using CC</p>

11

<p>I learned to put punctuation inside the quotation marks for actual quotations or dialogue, but would not put it inside the marks for just highlighting words, as in the OP. If the whole sentence is a quote, I put it punctuation inside, but it seems to me that it depends on the relationship between the quoted material and the whole sentence. I always put 2 spaces after a period though! And I still use the Oxford comma in series.</p>

12

<p>There is a short book called “The Mac Is Not A Typewriter” that describes how 2 spaces is a relic of the typewriter era in which you only had a monospaced font so you needed 2 spaces to show clearly the end of a sentence. Fonts on computers are designed so the letters fit together to make complete words so you don’t need an extra space to be clear the sentence is new.</p>

13

<p>The other thing that I learned which is no longer used is two spaces between the state and the zip code when typing an address </p>

<p>such as:</p>

<p>NY, NY 11111</p>

14

<p>I was taught punctuation inside the quotes, and two spaces after a period for that matter, not all that long ago-- I am the same age as most of your kids. Nobody I know does the two spaces thing, even my much older coworkers hassle me all the time thinking it’s a “new” thing, but I think my mother taught me. She’s a transcriptionist and I guess is pretty “old school” when it comes to grammar for that reason.</p>

<p>I’ve always had issues figuring out what to do with question marks though when they don’t apply to the full sentence. I put them outside the quotes because it makes more sense to me and I feel like that MUST be right, but feel dirty doing it.</p>

15

<p>You test this stuff yourself by opening any word processing program and switching to Courier - making sure it’s a monospaced version. Start typing. You’ll see how hard it is to differentiate between sentences without the visual clue of 2 spaces. You’ll also see it’s tough to read punctuation generally, which is a big reason why commas and periods were put inside quotes: so you could more easily read them in the mess that is monospaced typing. Each change is made for clarity purposes given the context of the time. The context shifts and people adhere to the old rules though they are now creating lack of clarity. Then the rules change to fit the new context and those last too long, etc. Rinse and repeat.*</p>

<p>When commas and periods were put inside quotes, the gain in clarity was worth the loss in clarity from questions of whether the punctuation really belongs outside. Not true anymore.</p>

<p>*And “rinse and repeat” directions were put on shampoo bottles to sell more shampoo.</p>

16

<p>A great summary of US/UK conventions:</p>

<p>[Punctuation</a> inside or outside quotation (speech) marks?](<a href=“http://www.grammar-monster.com/lessons/quotation_(speech)_marks_punctuation_in_or_out.htm]Punctuation”>Punctuation Inside or Outside Quotation Marks?)</p>

17

<p>Hanna, thanks for the link. I found this one interesting:</p>

<p>Did she really ask, “Do you love me?”?</p>

<p>Two question marks are considered acceptable but unwieldy by UK conventions. Not acceptable in the US.</p>

18

<p>I write with them outside like the British, though inside the quotes is “correct” in the USA. Things that I write for a living must follow the USA rule, or else they get edited by the review chain :rolleyes:</p>

<p>I also do 2 spaces, but do not feel nearly as strongly about that one.</p>

19

<p>And relatedly, why do people often leave a space between the last letter of the sentence and the question mark or exclamation ? ( like so )</p>

20

<p>hana, never seen that at all. </p>

<p>Here’s an example of what I mean about rules and how they change. I’m reading a book called Consider the Fork. A few pages describe how people used to carry knives around because you needed them to cut your food. Each person had his or her own personal knife. In the 17thC, the French shifted to providing knives at the table. Then the English intentionally made the knives duller and duller. The French passed a law preventing the manufacture of the old pointed dinner knives that were sharp on both edges. And so on. You hold a knife with the index finger along the top because it is intentionally dull so it doesn’t resemble a weapon. That is why we have steak knives: because table knives were rendered ineffectual. We bring out special knives rather than have sharp knives. Why? No one thinks about that anymore. It’s just the convention. Same with service at table. The service method was in the French mode with passed dishes and then became in the Russian mode with the dishes walked around and served. Same with cooking, which you can see referenced in Jane Austen novels: the chic mode became fricassee. </p>

<p>When you pick up a kitchen knife to prepare dinner and hold it wrong, meaning you put your finger along the top edge, you are enacting a choice made for the table a few hundred years ago. Knives were made dull and you were not expected to cut up things that weren’t already cooked to softness. So your knife skills are bad because dinner is so much about taking away your knife and then you apply that lesson when you actually need to use the knife well. </p>

<p>Punctuation is no different.</p>