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In English writing, quotation marks or inverted commas, also known informally as quotes, talking marks, [1] [2] speech marks, [3] quote marks, quotemarks or speechmarks, are punctuation marks placed on either side of a word or phrase in order to identify it as a quotation, direct speech or a literal title or name.
(The very quote is being questioned, so the question mark belongs outside; any punctuation at the end of the original quote is omitted.) When a quoted sentence fragment ends in a period, some judgment is required: if the fragment communicates a complete sentence, the period can be placed inside.
For example, "Stop!" has the punctuation inside the quotation marks because the word "stop" is said with emphasis. However, when using "scare quotes", the comma goes outside. Other examples: Arthur said the situation was "deplorable". (The full stop (period) is not part of the quotation.)
With quotation marks, we have no rigid rule. Some users prefer using one style (punctuation goes outside the quotation marks when quoting only part of a sentence, but inside when quoting a compete sentence), while other prefer another style (punctuation always goes inside quotation marks).
If the quotation is a single word or a sentence fragment, place the terminal punctuation outside the closing quotation mark. When quoting a full sentence, the end of which coincides with the end of the sentence containing it, place terminal punctuation inside the closing quotation mark. Miller wanted, he said, "to create something timeless".
North American printing usually puts full stops and commas (but not colons, semicolons, exclamation or question marks) inside the closing quotation mark, whether it is part of the original quoted material or not. [14] [15] Styles elsewhere vary widely and have different rationales for placing it inside or outside, often a matter of house style.
Since this style is not ugly, we can use it in ordinary writing, and the British do; the Americans, however, move the period inside the quotation marks, because ... I dunno why, they just do. — Toby 09:14 Nov 3, 2002 (UTC) As I understand it, it is a prejudice of American printers that little bits like periods look "bad" hanging outside the ...
For example, the rule of placing punctuation inside or outside of quotation marks refers chiefly to periods and commas. The rule for question marks is this: The question mark goes inside the quote if and only if it is part of the quote. Perfectly logical, and (I believe) the same on both sides of the Atlantic, so irrelevent to this discussion.