Hey grammarians - proofreading question!

[Piratecat]

In general, you put punctuation inside a closed parenthesis.

"I ate a Twinkie (but not the creme filling.)"

Is it ever appropriate to put the period outside the parenthesis? How about a comma?

"I plaguerized the text from Durbin (2005)."
"I plaguerized the text from Durbin (2005), but he doesn't know it yet."

Does anyone know the correct way to do it? Thanks!

 

[Dimwhit]

The punctuation goes outside the parentheses in your examples above. They only go inside if the text in parenthesis is a complete sentence. (Like if I were to do this.) Otherwise, outside.

Edit: I really need to proofread my posts before hitting submit.

 

[Samnell]

Though it's not an issue in PC's examples, if you end a sentence with a quote it's proper to put the period within the quotes. This is very weird in a grammar logic kind of way as the period could be original content inside the quote, but dates back to the days of manual typesetting when small pieces of type like the period were easy to lose or break. They held up better if they had a more substantial piece bracketing them on both sides. Being often doubly as thick, the quotation marks served admirably for that purpose.

 

[the_myth]

Though it's not an issue in PC's examples, if you end a sentence with a quote it's proper to put the period within the quotes. This is very weird in a grammar logic kind of way as the period could be original content inside the quote, but dates back to the days of manual typesetting when small pieces of type like the period were easy to lose or break. They held up better if they had a more substantial piece bracketing them on both sides. Being often doubly as thick, the quotation marks served admirably for that purpose.

And it's important to note that this is the American style.
British style uses single quotes with periods outside of them.

 

[Samnell]

And it's important to note that this is the American style.
British style uses single quotes with periods outside of them.

I was not aware of that, and I read a lot of British books. One wonders what poor editor was replaced by a computer that goes over the manuscript to change all of that for American editions.

 

[Blood Jester]

Agree 100% with Dimwhit, it is how I always do it, and how I learned it.

 

[Blood Jester]

And it's important to note that this is the American style.
British style uses single quotes with periods outside of them.

I believe single quotes are a no-no when "quoting" except when nesting quotes.

She was in full rant, "And then he says 'You are such street trash!' so I slapped him!"

A single quote is an apostrophe.

 

[Jdvn1]

The punctuation goes outside the parentheses in your examples above. They only go inside if the text in parenthesis is a complete sentence. (Like if I were to do this.) Otherwise, outside.

Edit: I really need to proofread my posts before hitting submit.

That's what I learned too. I think PC has confused parentheses with quotation marks.

 

[RangerWickett]

"I plaguerized the text from Durbin (2005)."
"I plaguerized the text from Durbin (2005), but he doesn't know it yet."

Also, it's "plagiarized."

Unless you've created a new word, in which case it sounds like you zapped him with a plague-causing ray gun.

 

[the_myth]

I believe single quotes are a no-no when "quoting" except when nesting quotes.

She was in full rant, "And then he says 'You are such street trash!' so I slapped him!"

A single quote is an apostrophe.

Sadly, I was hoping a Brit would pop on and correct you, but what you seem to cite as a general rule is simply the American rule. Standard British style is to default to single quotation marks, with the double-quotes being nested. Full-stops (aka periods) go outside the quotes.

So, for your example, the following is American:

She was in full rant, "And then he says, 'You are such street trash!' so I slapped him!"

In British style, it would probably be this:

She was in full rant, 'And then he says, "You are such street trash!" so I slapped him!'.


I did a quick search online and for further explanation, go here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quotation_marks
<scroll down to "typographical considerations">