(These exceptions are ignored by some Asian computer systems that systematically display quotation marks with the included spacing, as this spacing is part of the fixed-width characters.) A convention is the use of square brackets to indicate content between the quotation marks that has been modified from, or was not present in, the original material. In many cases, quotations that span multiple paragraphs are set as block quotations, and thus do not require quotation marks.

To discuss words

Quotation marks are also used to indicate the titles of creative works and highlight specific terms or phrases, often emphasizing tone. Quotation marks have many essential functions in grammar. While using numeric references can make a page more compatible with outdated browsers, using named references are safer for systems that handle multiple character encodings (i.e. RSS aggregators and search results). In addition, while the HTML 4, XHTML and XML specifications allow specifying numeric character references in either hexadecimal or decimal, SGML and older versions of HTML (and many old implementations) only support decimal references. If the encoding of the document supports direct representation of the characters, they can be used, but doing so can cause difficulties if the document needs to be edited by someone who is using an editor that cannot support the encoding.

Meaning of quotation mark in English

The quotation can be introduced with a transitional phrase followed by a comma, helping separate the spoken words from the rest of the sentence. You can skip the comma before or after the quote for short quotes or phrases within a sentence if they flow naturally. Here, commas distinguish the spoken words from the rest of the sentence.
With narration of direct speech, both styles retain punctuation inside the quotation marks, with a full stop changing into a comma if followed by attributive matter, also known as a speech tag or annunciatory clause. In the United States, the prevailing style is called American style, whereby commas and periods are almost always placed inside closing quotation marks. Periods and commas that are part of the person’s speech are permitted inside the quotation marks regardless of whether the material is fiction.

American style

• Unlike English, French does not identify unquoted material within a quotation by using a second set of quotation marks.
• Use double quotation marks to set off a direct (word-for-word) quotation.
• If the question mark or exclamation mark is not part of the quote but part of a question or statement, place it outside the quotation marks.
• Technically, the mark designating feet is a prime; the mark designating inches is a double prime.
• Note that the period goes inside both the single and double quotation marks.

In Russia, Ukraine and Belarus, the curved quotation marks, „…“, are used as a secondary level or in handwriting, while the angular marks, «…», are used as the primary level on printed text.citation needed The curved quotation marks (“66–99”) usage, “…”, was exported to some non-Latin scripts, notably where there was some English influence, for instance in Native American scripts and Indic scripts. After the publication of Filelfo’s edition, the quotation marks for literal quotations prevailed. The single quotation mark is traced to Ancient Greek practice, adopted and adapted by monastic copyists. The method for producing smart quotes may be based solely on the character preceding the mark. To make typographic quotation marks easier to enter, publishing software often automatically converts typewriter quotation marks (and apostrophes) to typographic form during text entry (with or without the user being aware of it).

Signalling unusual usage

• There is generally no space between an opening quotation mark and the following word, or a closing quotation mark and the preceding word.
• In Polish printed books and publications, this dictionary-recommended style for guillemets (also known as »German quotes«) is used almost exclusively.
• The use of English quotation marks is increasing in French and usually follows English rules, for instance in situations when the keyboard or the software context doesn’t allow the use of guillemets.
• The Unicode mapping for PostScript Standard Encoding preserves the typographic approximation convention by mapping its equivalent of ASCII grave and single-quote to the Unicode curly quotation mark characters.
• Some websites do not allow typographic quotation marks or apostrophes in posts.
• This is called nesting quotations.

In these cases, questions arise about the form (and names) of the quotation marks to be used. In Early Modern English, quotation marks were used to denote pithy comments. Because typewriter and computer keyboards lack keys to directly spinorhino casino enter typographic quotation marks, much of typed writing has neutral quotation marks. Typographic quotation marks are usually used in manuscript and typeset text. Single quotation marks are valid only within a quotation, as per Rule 7, above. Put the title of a short work—one that is or could be part of a larger undertaking—in quotation marks.

The angle shape was introduced later to make them easier to distinguish from apostrophes, commas and parentheses in handwritten manuscripts submitted to publishers. French news sites such as Libération, Les Échos and Le Figaro do not add manual spacing, leaving it up to localization and the browser to space the guillemets properly. This style of quoting is also used in Bulgarian, Czech, Danish, Estonian, Georgian, Icelandic, Latvian, Lithuanian, Russian, Serbo-Croatian, Slovak, Slovene and in Ukrainian. Verdana, were not designed with the flexibility to use an English left quote as a German right quote. It is also similar to—and often used to represent—the double prime symbol. Styles elsewhere vary widely and have different rationales for placing it inside or outside, often a matter of house style.
In Finnish and Swedish, right quotes, called citation marks, ”…”, are used to mark both the beginning and the end of a quote. In Central Europe, the practice was to use the quotation mark pairs with the convexity aimed inward. In Western Europe the custom became to use the quotation mark pairs with the convexity of each mark aimed outward. (For additional characters used in other languages, see Quotation mark § Summary table.) Prime and double prime are not present in most code pages, including ASCII and Latin-1, but are present in Unicode, as characters U+2032 ′ PRIME and U+2033 ″ DOUBLE PRIME.

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In non-fiction, some British publishers may permit placing punctuation that is not part of the person’s speech inside the quotation marks but prefer that it be placed outside. When quoted text is interrupted, such as with the phrase he said, a closing quotation mark is used before the interruption, and an opening quotation mark after. Likewise, the typographic opening single quotation mark is sometimes used to represent the ʻokina while either the typographic closing single quotation mark or the neutral single quotation mark may represent the prime symbol.
Since the 2000s, the plain quotes have become more common.citation needed The 2013 revision of the SI-1452 standard for Hebrew keyboard, available since 2012 in Windows 8 and in desktop Linux systems, supports both systems, as does the Gboard keyboard for touchscreen devices. In Israel, the traditional practice in printing and handwriting is to use „low-high” quote marks. Since these continuation marks are obsolete in French, there is no support for automatic insertion of continuation guillemets in HTML or CSS, nor in word-processors. With this older style there was also not necessarily any distinction of shape between the opening and closing guillemets; both often pointed to the right (as today’s French closing guillemets do).citation needed A line-break should not be allowed between the en-dash and the first word of the quotation. The symbol used as the left (typographical) quote in English is used as the right quote in Germany and Austria and a “low double comma” „ (not used in English) is used for the left quote.
Also note that, as a courtesy, there is visible space between adjacent single and double quotation marks. Use single quotation marks for quotations within quotations. If a question is within the quoted material, a question mark should be placed inside the quotation marks. Less commonly, single quotation marks are used in place of parentheses, in which case the translation is not set off with commas. Because the quoted material is set off from the main text, it is not necessary to use quotation marks.
Some websites do not allow typographic quotation marks or apostrophes in posts. This is a continuation of a typewriter tradition of using ticks for opening quotation marks; see Quotation mark § Typewriters and early computers. In English, when a quotation follows other writing on a line of text, a space precedes the opening quotation mark unless the preceding symbol, such as an em dash, requires that there be no space. Americans tend to apply quotations when signifying doubt of veracity (sarcastically or seriously), to imply another meaning to a word or to imply a cynical take on a paraphrased quotation, without punctuation at all. According to the Jargon File from 1983, American hackers (members of a subculture of enthusiastic programmers) switched to what they later discovered to be the British quotation system because placing a period inside a quotation mark can change the meaning of data strings that are meant to be typed character-for-character. It is also similar to the use of quotation marks in many other languages (including Portuguese, Spanish, French, Italian, Catalan, Dutch and German).