Pet peeve

[marinav]

Upon moving to this country, I made the transition from the metric system (and it hurt). I went from writing "$3,50" to "$3.50" with somewhat lesser pain. But what really gets me and drives me batty is the use of punctuation inside quotation marks, American style. Having been primarily educated in Europe, I was taught the British/European style

Comments

[anagramatica]

I have always understood the "European" style to be the correct way. And Macneil says the same.

[marinav]

I've had points deducted for this and the APA and MLA style both say to keep the punctuation inside the quotes. Ridiculous. I guess it doesn't have to make sense, we're supposed to follow the rules, silly as they may be. Blech!

[anagramatica]

Some of us don't follow those style manuals! The Chicago style is what I use, and was allowable for my thesis. I guess my view is, it's called "style" for a reason. It's a fashion. Of course, professors tend to believe so much in their own sense of fashion that nothing else could possibly be correct. Here's what The Chicago Manual of Style says

[marinav]

Cool. Looks like Chicago Style has it together. :o) You're right about it just being a "fashion" so to speak. All the more reason to go with what is logical, rather than someone else's sense of fashion.

[mshonle]

It's only the periods that go to the left of the quote. Question marks and explaimation points always appear to the left if it's in the quote itself, and to the right if it isn't.

[mshonle]

Uhh, it's early in the morning. Only that could explain my horrible spelling today.

[tarwatersghost]

My style sucks. I think that I suffer from terminal inconsistency and that it's a mircale if I can write a full sentence without at least one glaring error.

[tarwatersghost]

See???

[marinav]

Ha! Same here! :o)

[karl_with_a_k]

I agree that it's as messed-up as a football bat.

[marinav]

Ha! Good one! :o)