Friday, July 20, 2012

punctuation - Punctuating Quoted Questions in a Parenthetical Clause








Someone asked What is the difference between saying:




Are you still working there?



Do you still work there?




I started my answer with:





For your specific example, "Are you still working there?" versus "Do you still work there?", when referring to having a job at a company both are commonly used.




That punctuation feels wrong, but I don't know what would be preferable in American English. I am referring in particular about ending the parenthetical phrase with "Do you still work there?",. (Wow, how about the punctuation of that sentence.) I need the question mark because of the question, I need the quotes to end the quotation, I need the comma to end the parenthetical, but the rules for punctuation around quotation marks are so odd to my way of thinking that I feel like I must be doing something wrong.



What do you think? Is this the best way (without rewriting the sentence) to punctuate it? If not, what would be better?



EDIT:
So far we have :





  • The Chicago Manual of Style not specifically addressing this case but generally saying "Do you still work there?"

  • The Gregg Reference Manual saying "Do you still work there?" BUT "if the omission of a comma at this point could lead to confusion, reword the sentence to avoid the problem."

  • and most everyone else agreeing with me on "Do you still work there?",



So yeah, go ahead and close it, as we are not going to settle the question here?

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