1

I often see people emphasising words. For example: This smartphone is very 'smart'. I was taught in a highschool education website called Education Perfect that apostrophes are only used for possession, contraction, and for quotation within quotation. Never for emphasis, which would normally be bolded or made italic.

But I so often see people using singe quotation marks for emphasis or just when they think it looks better than a double quotation mark. Example: In his article, "It's time to tackle urban sprawl", published on 'The Urban Developer' website, Anthony... blah blah blah

I don't know the validity of Education Perfect so I'd like to ask if the so commonly used quotation mark for emphasis is actually valid? It annoys me to no end when I see high academic work that still do it

Megumin
  • 29
  • 1
    I think you misunderstand the way "scare quotes" are used in written English. They're not there to indicate *emphasis* as such, but to alert the reader that the thus-flagged term is being used *in an ironic, referential, or otherwise non-standard sense. It's irrelevant whether they're single or double quote marks (or indeed, "air quotes", for the conversational* equivalent, where the speaker might extend either one or two fingers on each raised hand while speaking the non-standard usage). It's not necessarily "informal", either. – FumbleFingers Aug 12 '21 at 13:38
  • This website says "scare quotes" should always be used with double quotation marks: https://www.grammarphobia.com/blog/2014/06/scare-quotes.html

    I understand their intended purpose may be to be ironic, but what if they ARE used solely for pure emphasis? Would that mean the scare quote is used incorrectly, and it should be removed?

     – Megumin Aug 12 '21 at 13:43
  • ..if I encountered This smartphone is very 'smart' with no other context to guide me, I'd probably assume the intended meaning there was *elegant, stylish, chic, since without* the scare quotes, in the context of a modern phone, we'd normally understand a *smart* phone as being *clever, intelligent, capable* (through powerful processor & software). – FumbleFingers Aug 12 '21 at 13:46
  • Your what if they ARE used solely for pure emphasis? point is meaningless. They aren't. Ever. – FumbleFingers Aug 12 '21 at 13:46
  • They... are though? I 'hate' it when people misunderstand.

    There you go, that's an example. I intended the word "hate" to be for emphasis for my hatred, not to be ironic in its meaning. If you think I misused scare quotes, then that's literally an example of what I'm referring to. Please try to be more flexible as I've found many sources that differ from your opinion as aforementioned with how you said single or double quotation marks are irrelevant, as well as your saying they are not informal.

     – Megumin Aug 12 '21 at 13:49
  • Double quotation marks are commonly used for emphasis, even if this is judged incorrect: signs such as Made "fresh" in store or "no" smoking please are widely documented. Occasionally you see single ones: that link has an example We 'fix' Hondas affordably. (The phenomenon was also mentioned on Language Log.) – Stuart F Aug 12 '21 at 13:51
  • 1
    In your example, the quoted comment is in double quotes like speech, and the name of the website in single quotes. It's perfectly legitimate to put the title of a book etc. in quotation marks as an alternative to using italics. – Kate Bunting Aug 12 '21 at 13:52
  • I was also taught that I'm not to use two different types of quotation marks for the same purpose in the same writing, like how the example used double quotation for a headline and single quotation for a website name— both being titles and therefore the same purpose? – Megumin Aug 12 '21 at 13:56
  • I don't accept I 'hate' it when people misunderstand as an example of "emphasis". Note that *my* use of this orthographic convention with the first instance of the word "emphasis" (but not the second) is as described in my Wikipedia link: Scare quotes may indicate that the author is using someone else's term, similar to preceding a phrase with the expression "so-called". But to me at least, an example like I 'hate' it when people misunderstand simply indicates poorly-educated or non-native Anglophone writer, nothing more. – FumbleFingers Aug 12 '21 at 14:02
  • 1
    If I 'hate' it when people misunderstand isn't emphasis what is it? Are you suggesting some people don't know the word hate or regard it with sufficient suspicion to put scare quotes around it? It would be perfectly reasonable to emphasise the word "hate" in that sentence either by spoken stress or "I hate it when people misunderstand". In the blogs of incorrect quotation marks, putting quotes around a word often seems similar to surrounding it in glitter and stars or underlining or putting it in red, all methods of emphasis. – Stuart F Aug 12 '21 at 14:05
  • ...just because quote marks can legitimately be used instead of italics in referential contexts (name of a book being referred to in an utterance, for example) doesn't mean they can also be used instead of italics that are used to convey emphasis. They can't, so far as I'm concerned. – FumbleFingers Aug 12 '21 at 14:05
  • @StuartF: I'm saying that I 'hate' it when people misunderstand isn't natural English, so it's meaningless to talk about what it "means". (Except that it 'means' the writer is blah blah... :) – FumbleFingers Aug 12 '21 at 14:06
  • 1
    Nobody is saying that using quotes for emphasis is correct. But still, people do it, just as they misuse apostrophes and spell things wrong. Even if something isn't perfect English it's still meaningful to discuss what it means or what the speaker intended, and linguists do this all the time. – Stuart F Aug 12 '21 at 14:08
  • @FumbleFingers So you don't accept it? That's literally all you had to say, instead of denying the existence of situations where grammar is misused. Also, I'd prefer a more concrete answer such as "That is grammatically incorrect" or "I cannot give an absolute answer for this, but..." instead of "I don't accept" because you don't have much credibility when saying that – Megumin Aug 12 '21 at 14:10
  • @StuartF: The question asks whether you "can" use quote marks to convey emphasis. I would have said the answer is a straightforward "No!" - but if you won't be persuaded of that, it's presumably an Off Topic "matter of opinion" anyway. – FumbleFingers Aug 12 '21 at 14:11
  • Duplicate of Did quotation marks have other applications or uses, like for emphasis?. – jsw29 Aug 12 '21 at 15:45

0 Answers0