Punctuation Errors: American and British Quotation Marks

Quotation marks are used to set off speech or quoted sentences and words. Despite its simple role, people tend to get confused about the position of other punctuation in relation to the quotation marks. Should it go inside or outside the quotation marks?

It depends. If you are writing in American English, other punctuation should go inside the quotation marks, even if it is not part of the quoted sentence. Here is an example from the New York Times:

“When we have got a contractor city, say, of 180,000 people, and there hasn’t been a completed prosecution of anybody coming out of Iraq, not one,” he said, “what sort of city in America would be like that, where no one is prosecuted for anything for three years? It’s unthinkable.”

If you are writing in British English, on the other hand, punctuation that is not part of the quoted sentence should be place outside the quotation marks. Here is an example from The Telegraph:

A crisis in the US subprime mortgage market will affect Britain, he said, warning that the housing market is likely to weaken as a result. However, he insisted that the economy is starting from “a very strong position”.

Notice that colons and semicolons are always placed outside the quotation marks, and that you should not finish a sentence with more than one punctuation mark, regardless of the rule you are using.

Daniel Scocco on October 5, 2007 Subscribe to our RSS Feed

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10 Responses to “Punctuation Errors: American and British Quotation Marks”

kalsangdorjee on October 5th, 2007 2:12 pm

what is the Active
Calvin Spealman on October 5th, 2007 8:10 pm

It has been observed by others that technical writing has migrated to punctuation outside the quotes in order to stay consistant with places were we cannot be ambiguous with the quoted content.
Daniel on October 5th, 2007 9:21 pm

Correct Calvin, thanks for pointing out.
saeed on October 7th, 2007 5:42 pm

??
Maria Melo on October 15th, 2007 10:13 pm

Are there any other names for “Ellipsis”?
I’ve already heard “omision points”, “three dots”, “three periods”.
Can we say that?
Thank you
Maria
Maria Melo on October 15th, 2007 10:15 pm

I mean “omission points”
Thank you again
Daniel on October 17th, 2007 7:09 pm

Maria I believe these names are valid, although I always referred to it as ellipsis.
lawyerjourno on July 14th, 2008 10:04 am

I really get confused most of the time about punctuation marks. For me if writing is making sense and is not advertentally affecting the meaninf of the sentence punctuation marks should not bother us.
PreciseEdit on July 14th, 2008 4:18 pm

Although we apply the American English conventions for our U.S. clients, the British conventions around quotations make more sense to us. This is especially true for quotation marks indicating specific words, for example when creating a list. (e.g.: I like the words “friendly,” “happy,” and “joyous.”)

Note: When using American English conventions, the end punctuation for quotations may also be outside of the quotation marks if the sentence ends in a question mark that is not part of the quote, as in:
Did he really write “punctuation marks should not bother us”?

Correct use of punctuation not only helps a reader to make sense of the text but also helps the author make sure he or she is correctly communicating the intended ideas.
Beth on August 12th, 2008 2:42 pm

What about quotations around apostrophes that represent the slang pronunciation of a word? For example:
As Bob Dylan said, “the times, they are a-changin’.”

Since the apostrophe is not like a single quotation and it is not a full stop (as the period is), shouldn’t it remain within the period?