Using Quotation Marks

18.6 Using Quotation Marks

Learning Objectives

Properly place quotation marks around dialogue and borrowed words.
Use quotation marks with titles of short works, definitions, words used in special ways, and original words.
Correctly incorporate other punctuation with quotations.

Quotation marks are used to mark dialogue, to indicate words that are borrowed, to emphasize certain details, and to help when giving credit for written works.

Using Quotation Marks to Signal Dialogue and Borrowed Words

Quotation marks are a key component of written dialogue. All words of a dialogue must be enclosed within quotation marks to indicate that these words are the exact words of the speaker.

“The one thing that doesn’t abide by majority rule is a person’s conscience,” Atticus said.

When you talk about or summarize spoken words rather than presenting them as dialogue, you should not put quotation marks around them since you are not necessarily saying that they are the exact words the person said.

Jem once said that Boo’s dad was the meanest man alive.

As with dialogue, you also should use quotation marks to mark the exact words that you borrow from someone else.

About Harper Lee’s first interview since 1964, Paul Harris writes, “Lee has regularly turned down every interview request for decades but now, aged 79, has been tempted out of her shell by the University of Alabama.”Paul Harris, “Mockingbird Author Steps out of Shadows,” The Observer, Feb. 6, 2006.

An exception to using quotation marks around borrowed words is that lengthier quotations of others’ work (those of more than four lines of text) are set in indented block format for the sake of easier readability. Also, if you paraphrase another’s ideas in your words, you need to cite the source of the ideas, but you should not use quotation marks since the words are your own. For more on quoting and paraphrasing sources, see Chapter 22 "Appendix B: A Guide to Research and Documentation", Section 22.2 "Integrating Sources".

Use single quotation marks around a quotation within a quotation.

Example

According to Paul Harris, Lee “did have warm words about the screenplay of her book, which was turned into the hit film starring Gregory Peck in the 1960s. ‘I think it is one of the best translations of a book to film ever made,’ she said.”Paul Harris, “Mockingbird Author Steps out of Shadows,” The Observer, Feb. 6, 2006.

Using Quotation Marks to Enclose Titles of Short Works

Italics indicate titles of full-length books and other lengthy, completed works. To separate short works from these longer works, short works are enclosed in quotation marks rather than being placed in italics. Some examples of short works that should be included in quotation marks are articles in periodicals, book chapters or sections, essays, newspaper and magazine articles and reviews, short poems and stories, song titles, titles of television episodes, and titles of unpublished works, such as dissertations, papers, and theses.

Examples

Treatment for full-length books: I first read To Kill a Mockingbird in eighth grade.

Treatment for short works: In “A Child Shall Lead Them,” Michael Richardson suggests that Lee presents justice through the innocent eyes of a child in an effort to show its true form.

Using Quotation Marks to Identify Definitions

Using quotation marks is the accepted technique for identifying definitions that are used in running text.

Characters in To Kill a Mockingbird visit the apothecary, which means “drugstore.”

Using Quotation Marks to Draw Attention to Words Used in a Special or Original Way

Quotation marks can help clarify that a word is being used in an unusual rather than in a straightforward manner. Without the quotation marks, readers might get a totally different meaning from a sentence.

That course was really challenging.
That course was really “challenging.” (Putting the word challenging in quotation marks lets us know that the sentence is probably using irony to say that the course was not challenging at all.)

If you create an original word to fit your specific needs, put the word in quotation marks to indicate to readers that the word is not a standard word.

Many accounts suggest that Harper Lee was very “Scout-like.”

Using Other Punctuation with Quotation Marks

It helps to know rules of using other punctuation marks in conjunction with quotation marks.

Rules

Rule: Put question marks and exclamation marks inside the quotation marks if the marks relate directly and only to the text within quotation marks. If, on the other hand, the marks relate to the whole sentence, put the marks outside the quotation marks.

Example 1: A girl in the back of the room asked, “What character did Robert Duvall play?”

Example 2: Did Mary Richards really “make it after all”?

Rule: Periods and commas always go inside the quotation marks, even if the quotation marks are only around the last word in the sentence.

Example 1: Scout asked Jem how old she was when their mother died, and Jem answered, “Two.”

Example 2: Even as an adult years later, Scout was likely to say that the summer of the trial lasted “forever,” due to the many life lessons she learned.

Rule: Place colons and semicolons outside quotation marks.

Example 1: I remember my first impression after reading Frost’s “Death of a Hired Man”: confusion.

Example 2: We had tickets to see the one-act play “Masks”; however, the blizzard hit just as we were trying to leave.

Guarding against Using Unneeded Quotation Marks

Special word usage, such as irony and made-up words, are placed in quotation marks. But do not use quotation marks just to make regular-use words stand out.

Example

When Jem met Dill, Jem said that Dill was awfully “puny.” (The word puny should not be put in quotation marks since it is a standard word being used with its straightforward meaning.)

If you choose to use slang or colloquialisms, do not give a sense that you are apologizing for the words by putting them inside quotation marks. Choose the slang words and colloquialisms you want to use and let them stand on their own.

Example

Calpurnia was very “down-to-earth.” (Do not put quotation marks around down-to-earth.)

Key Takeaways

Use quotation marks to identify exact words spoken words and words borrowed from another person.
Use quotation marks with titles of short works, such as articles in periodicals, book chapters or sections, essays, newspaper and magazine articles and reviews, short poems and stories, song titles, titles of television episodes, and titles of unpublished works, such as dissertations, papers, and theses.
Place quotation marks around definitions, words used in special ways, and words you make up to fill a particular need.
Place all periods and commas inside of quotation marks.
Place question marks and exclamation marks inside when they refer only to the content of the text inside the quotation marks and outside when they refer to the whole sentence.
Place colons and semicolons outside quotation marks.

Exercise

Read each sentence. If a sentence should have quotation marks, add them in the correct place. If a sentence does not need quotation marks, write “no quotation marks.”
1. Oh, right, I forgot Shanda was too sick to go to work today. I saw her out shopping.
2. Doug asked, Were you in the gym when Ben broke his arm?
3. Ellen McPeek Glisan’s dissertation was entitled The Effect of Classmate Photographs on Online Community and Connectedness.
4. I wasn’t very happy when George said I was calm.
5. FDR showed his sense of humor when he said Be sincere; be brief; be seated.
6. You are very funny; remember that funny also means impertinent.
7. Annie said, I’ll see you at 5:00 p.m.
8. Keep in mind that I’m a sew-happy girl!