My first post after lurking since the earth was flat - and in the Pit no less.
Can someone help me with this, as this is not how I was taught? I was taught that all sentences must end in some form of punctuation - period, question mark, etc. In the case of quotes, the period goes outside the quotation marks unless there is a sentence containing a quotation within a larger sentence. I’m not explaining this well, so some examples: The man said the woman in the hotel room was his “wife”.
Period goes outside quote, as quote is just a part of the sentence, and not an independent sentence.
His statement “I was accompanied by my wife.” was found by the investigating officer to be untrue.
The quote is a complete sentence, and gets a period inside the quotes. The quote is part of a larger sentence, and the larger sentence gets a period of its own.
These may not be the best examples, particularly the second one. I seem to recall constructions where there was a period inside a quote, the terminal quotation mark, and then a period ending the larger sentence: He stated to the police “I was with my wife the whole night.”.
I know the Pit is not necessarily the place for friendly advice, but can any of you mavens steer me straight? I’m no grammar wiz, but I do try to get it right.
Oops - in the spirit of the pit: can any of you way-too-uptight asshole grammar freaks advise me?
…I wrote a grand Jury Report all by my lonesome. this is edited by a team of 9 editors, passed on by the entire Grand Jury, is reviewed by the Chief Clerk, and by The Presiding Judge of the Superiour Court, the District Attorney, and County Counsel. They found no grammar or spelling errors, or anything along those lines to corrct, except the editorial commitee, that put my report in a somewhat different format, so that all the reports looked similar. Did not have to change a word, just some new headers & moved a couple of lines around. I had no problem with that.
I also wrote a number of Sections for a Procedure manual for a large Federal Dept.
I have no problems with good grammar, or spelling. We should all use these. What I have a problem with is the self-appointed “mayvens” & “experts” that make up “rules” that are not helpful, not useful, and wrong as often as not. For example, as Pulkamell shows, the “rules” for “split infinitives”, “dangling prepositions” and “double negatives” exist only in those self-righteous mavens minds (or books). A brief reading of the grammar guide of my Oxford mentions NONE of these rules. And since there is no “recognized arbiter”, and the Mayvens & experts often disagree, there is a reasonable amount of flexibility in the “rules”.
[QUOTE]
This is kind of my point, though. I’ll assume for the sake of argument that your normal, professional writing is beyond reproach. But I don’t really have any proof of it so far. So, what about your writing here? Do you not care enough to demonstrate your literacy while posting to a message board that prides itself on stamping out ignorance? One should do as well as one can, I would think.
Anyone else entertained by the number of posters in this thread who misspelled “grammar” as “grammer?”
Heh.
Now, waaaaay back up there, 2sense asked:
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I refer to a (rather brilliant) post I made back in a Pit Thread about Flying Children:
**
It was a glorious post; the bugger left and never came back. Anyway, the URL is still good, 2sense and the source offers a number of enlightening examples regarding the proper use of semi-colons.
As far was why the semi-colon is teamed up with the colon, I think it makes sense: the pair share similar uses and look alike. 'Nuff said.
And, by the way, as is evidenced by the post from which I excerpted, I think that there are times when it is reasonable to berate someone for their errors in grammar. In a place such as this, for example, a communications hub with the declared purpose of fighting ignorance, it is reasonable to expect the participants in a debate to follow an accepted code of grammar.
Pleased ta meetcha, Shaky. One who posts in the Pit for the first time is to be admired for his courage. I’m still shaky about being here, myself.
I copy verbatim some text which I hope answers your questions regarding quotation marks used in combination with other punctuation. Not knowing how to do indented text when posting, I will not enclose this text in quotation marks in order to avoid any confusion:
Quotation marks go outside of commas and periods, even if the comma or period is not part of the quote.
[Example] The term on which we must focus is "intent."
The rule is not meant to reflect logical concerns, but rather graphic ones. It looks funny to see thet period or comma sitting out there alone.
. . .
Whether quotation marks go inside or outside other punctuation marks depends on logic. Put the other mark inside the quotation marks if it is part of the quote; put it outside if it is not. This rule applies to both double quotation marks ("—") and single ones (’—’).
[Example] Common law recognized a defense to a privacy action where, "the incident was a public concern and record"; however, the statutory policy had in effect eliminated this defense.
The semicolon is not part of the quote, so it goes outside the marks.
[Example] Smith reports, "a majority of the jurors thought 'infer' meant 'assume'!"
The exclamation point is part of the quote, so it goes inside the quotation marks.
Cite: Mary Barnard Ray and Jill J. Ramsfield, “Getting It Right and Getting It Written”
— Back to normal space —
I have three grammar books open in front of me this afternoon. If anyone has any specific questions, I’ll be happy to look up any grammar rule for them.
I can’t believe that I missed your reply. I thank you for it. I notice that I am 1 of the dumbasses that misspelled “grammar”. Perhaps my opinion is not as valuable as Lexicon’s; however, I think my argument is strong enough to convince me.
Always putting the periods, commas, etc. inside the quotation marks is strictly an American thing, is it not? I presume that the rest of the English-speaking world (esp. Britain and its former colonies) have the good sense not to follow this idiotic “rule”!
Blech! Blech blech blech! I hate the look. Is this the “rule” everywhere, or just with this one source? I can understand apostrophe-ing a single letter or number, but I see no need to apostrophe a several letter…anything. Besides, we see what is happening here…wanton apostrophe madness. Apostrophe-ing the whole damn language. Blech. I hate this trend.
This is like teaching a pig to sing: It wastes your time and annoys the pig.
When, way back when, I was a virginal newbie, I too, made a big deal of grammar, punctuation, syntax, etc…
You are banging your head against a brick wall. When it starts to feel good you should stop and then read the rest of my post!
Trust me, only you, me and a hand full of others really give a rat’s ass if the spelling, punctuation and all is “correct”. No one else notices or cares. “I don’t give a shit”, springs to mind.
At this point, being an “old hand” [giggle] at this game I’ve found that it really doesn’t matter. As long as the idea is clear. Can you communicate? Yes? GREAT! At this point I’m happy if someone can find the home keys!
So, you fuck up your and you’re. You can’t grasp the difference between to, too and two. Is your basic communication clear? That’s all that matters.
I know, for all the English majors out there it really hurts to see this but take a deep breath and relax… it’s just a message board. Only jump on someone if they REALLY think they are so smart and they make a really simple mistake. Like I’ve probably done above. God knows, one of you sick little shits will find SOMETHING wrong with my post. You persnickety little coprophagia posters!
I believe that’s right, or at least I know I’ve seen this in the work of some British writers, whether or not that’s the convention outside the U.S. I know that editor/publishers often apply their own normally orthodox rules of grammar and punctuation to the work of others (even with geniuses like Joyce and Fitzgerald), so you can’t always come to a firm conclusion on a writer’s usage even when you go right to the source, so to speak.
My boss finds this rule so distasteful (though he acknowledges it is “correct”) that he simply refuses to follow it and becomes annoyed when it’s pointed out to him. It’s like tucking your shirttail into your underwear, he says.
For some reason I am defectively wired in a manner that always seems to make me zero in on grammar issues in general and this rule in particular. I notice it everywhere. But I’ll take the title of “maven” over “anal-retentive mental defective,” since that seems to be the general choice available in this thread.
NECROS: and just what problem do you find with my posts here? I have already apologized for my poor typing & typos, but neither of these show a lack of literacy. They show a lack of typing skills, which I have "mea culpa"ed. Show me where my posts show a lack of literacy, please.
YOSEMITE; I am afraid “Oxford” also agrees with the “’” in “p’s” and “7’s”. It says no to “’” in “1940s” or “CDs”. I’ll check my bigger ed., tomorrow to see what it says about “GI’s”. Sorry, but I don’t think it is a big deal.
And, esprix, not so cocky not I trumped your sources with the “Oxford”, eh?
Now that you’ve gottent that inanity out of your system, twobie, let’s look at the facts:
(1) You launched a tirade against the Constitution,
(2) Many folks posted the facts about said document,
(3) Said folks showed how wrong you were,
(4) You ran from the discussion,
(5) You then tried to jump start the discussion in another thread,
(6) You were again proven to be unfamiliar with the document,
(7) In both threads, I pointed out how wrong you were, and you launched a personal, yet still inane, attack on me,
(8) You recently admitted that you actually do know nothing about the document,
(9) You recently showed you also know nothing about the topic of this thread,
(10) And true to form, you once again make an inane attack on me.
Do you actually have any education or are the taxpayers still sending you to school just to keep you off the streets?
p.s. It might be fun to read: “(11) Twobie finally admits that he doesn’t know about this subject either.”
Well put - there are rules, but the rules do change over time. Like I said, this is both the advantage and disadvantage of speaking a living language.
Necros wrote:
Also well said. It’s one thing to say, “The rules change!” but another entirely to ignore the rules as they exist - it just makes one look ignorant.
Danielinthewolvesden whined:
Hmmm, you start a thread in The Pit whining about grammar, use it incorrectly, and wonder why people pick on you about it. C’mon, Dan, you’ve been around long enough to know what happens when you start a thread anywhere on this board.
Just because a word is in the dictionary doesn’t mean it’s acceptable to use in every grammatical circumstance. Hell, they probably put it in there because so many idiots think it’s an acceptable alternative to “though” that they use it enough to warrant it being explained in a dictionary. Do you use “alot” as well? Any editor who lets “tho” pass for “though” should be fired immediately.
And did you use “tho” in these types of documents? It might pass for your gaming magazine articles, but not for anything worth reading.
I’m not denying you’re a smart guy, Daniel - you’ve proven that several times - but blatantly disregarding the basics of grammar and then complaining about those who nit-pick you about it is just juvenile. If you want to write in your own “style,” then fine, write that way, but accept that those who stick to the rules are going to point out your errors, particularly on the SDMB. I didn’t think you were that thin-skinned.
If you don’t have a problem with it, then why are you complaining? Use good grammar and spelling and English syntax and the mavens won’t rag on you.
My sincerest apologies I couldn’t post a reply the moment you posted your own witty reparte, you pedantic boor, but I finished work, went home, and engaged in this thing called a life. :rolleyes:
Shaky Jake wrote:
This seems like it would be acceptable either way in that context (period inside or outside the quotes); personally, I’d put it inside.
This is incorrect - it should read:
His statement, “I was accompanied by my wife,” was found by the investigating officer to be untrue.
You could also write:
He stated, “I was accompanied by my wife.” This was found by the investigating officer to be untrue."
Now, if you had written:
His statement, “I was accompanied by my wife!” was found by the investigating officer to be untrue.
That’s a different story - there are different rules for exclamation points and question marks.
This is completely wrong - there should be no second period outside the quotes.
Byzantine wrote:
I’ll agree that the bottom line is communication - if your idea gets across, efficiently or not so much, then you’ve done what you need a language to do. (See bjOrn for an example of how not to communicate.)
I was going to reply with something along the lines of: “You don’t really want me to do that, do you? Let’s just be friends.”
But, this is the Pit, and there are rules here, right? One of which is that when someone asks you to make fun of them, you have to do it. So, here goes. Nothing personal, Daniel.
Disclaimer: I’m not Cecil. I am not going to go through this line by line and point out errors. I’m just going for a few glaring ones.
Dude. What is the deal with you and capitalizing words? You don’t get to cap letters anytime you want. There are rules for doing this sort of thing. I know that you said you type inconsistently, and I accept that. But I’d be very surprised if your typing deficiency extended to wandering over and holding down the shift key at random.
So they had to correct the editorial committee? Do you have some sort of misplaced modifier here? Do you see what I’m saying? Not to mention that you then continue the madness by tacking on “that put my report in a somewhat different format, so that all the reports looked similar,” which sends everything straight to hell.
As in they did not have to change a word? Is there a subject of that sentence? But, hey, sentence fragments can be stylistic. I’ll let that one slide.
More random capitals…
This part is a train wreck. Despite having no problem with spelling, you’ve managed to spell mavens two separate ways, in three places, and only once did you spell it correctly.
Just as with capitalization, you don’t get to “throw” “quotes” around any “word” that you “choose” to. I feel like I’m in Implied Sarcasm Land.
“Self-righteous mavens minds” takes an apostrophe after mavens.
And I know it’s also stylistic, but and is spelled with three letters, not a symbol. Who are you, Prince?
I could do more, but why? I just want you to accept my point: If you don’t write correctly, why do you expect people to take you seriously?
In all fairness, Exprix, Daniel didn’t start this thread to whine about grammar: I did. I knew it would cause a fracas, but I love the English language so much that I enjoy seeing people get as impassioned about it as I feel.
To clarify things a little, I am not bothered by SDMB posters who are casual in their typing and postings, because this is a chatty casual place. My original rant reflected my never-ending impatience with poor writing in general: menus, pamphlets, websites, you name it. Also, in my work, I must see errors in grammar go out all the time because I do not rank highly enough to correct the author. I know Esprix can relate. This is a good place to express our built-up frustration!
I also agree that English is a dynamic, changing language. I remember an attorney once expressing his annoyance that people used “made-up” words like “prioritize” and “impact” (as a verb). I pointed out to him that if new words were never assimilated into the language, we would still be speaking in very Olde English grunts. He was not impressed. However, grammar rules exist to give us a standardized way to communicate effectively. If you observe the rules, you will impress anyone reading your work. Readers will be better able to pay attention to what you have to say, and isn’t that what it’s all about?
Grammar and spelling “rules” are, of course completely arbitrary. However, “Hi, how are you?” and “¡Hola! ¿Como estás?” differ only due to grammar, spelling and punctuation. Rules of spelling, punctuation and grammar define a language. And, like copyrights and trademarks, those rules must be enforced to continue to have meaning.
Naturally these rules are not laws. No one is (seriously) proposing that we organize a posse and hang those who ignore the basic rules of grammar and spelling.
The purpose of writing is to communicate. Your reader has quite a lot of work to do before he even begins to comprehend the meaning of your ideas. He must evaluate the shape of the letters, put them together into words, parse the sentences to find subject, verb, object, etc. and relate sentences together into coherent ideas.
Ideally, you want to make the mechanics of reading your prose completely transparent for the reader. Ignoring the rules of grammar, spelling and punctuation require your reader to consciously think about the mechanics. This requirement is an imposition on your reader. You surround your ideas with a barrier of thorns; most readers, myself included, will simply not take the time to carefully pick their way through on the off chance that they conceal an interesting idea.
Of course, you may indeed choose to deliberately obfuscate your ideas in such a thicket of poor grammar, “alternative spelling” or ill-chosen punctuation. Do not be surprised, however, when your ideas are subsequently ignored.
Ultimately, the rules provide a baseline for efficient communication. A master can bend or break the rules, but he must know very precisely the effect of the exception will have in the mind of his reader. For most of us ordinary schlubs, it’s probably safest to observe the rules rigorously; we lack the advanced skill to bend them in an entertaining and interesting manner, appearing rather either inconsiderate or ignorant.
And, since this is the Pit, dAniEl can, kiss! My hairy white-flabby “Ass.” Write clearly or expect to be ignored.
I admit it. My post was an opinion. I know much less about grammar than the other posters on this thread, including Monty.
Hi Monty,
I was rereading our original conversation about “the unmentionable” to support a rebuttal to your post above. When I read about our point of disagreement I found a surprise. You were correct. It was I who was mistaken.
I admit that I was wrong.
Perhaps we can now put our dislike for each other behind us now. I regret my recent insult. I would like to bury the hatchet.
Is this possible?
