Scare quotes
Encyclopedia
Scare quotes are quotation mark
s placed around a word or phrase to indicate that it does not signify its literal or conventional meaning.
If scare quotes are enclosing a word or phrase that does not represent a quotation from another source they may simply serve to alert the reader that the word or phrase is used in an unusual, special, or "non-standard" way or should be understood to include caveats to the conventional meaning.
Alternatively, material in scare quotes may represent the writer's concise (but possibly misleading) paraphrasing, characterization, or intentional misrepresentation of statements, concepts, or terms used by a third party. This may be an expression of sarcasm or incredulity, or it may also represent a rhetoric
al attempt to frame a discussion in the writer's desired (non-standard) terms (e.g. a circumlocution
, an apophasis
, or an innuendo
).
The term scare quotes may be confusing because the word scare implies provocation, yet the term covers emotionally neutral usage as well. In many cases an author uses scare quotes not to convey alarm, but to signal a semantic quibble.
In this passage the writer uses scare quotes around the word invention to express the opinion that Herodotus
is incorrect in ascribing to the Lydians
the role of the inventors of coin
age. The writer does not begin enclosing the word invention in quotation marks until he begins to express skepticism that its usage was appropriate. In this case, unlike many other applications of scare quotes, the enclosed word is an actual quotation from another source.
Example 2:
The quotation marks around 130-year-old indicate that the news source is reporting but not endorsing the claim.
A writer may choose to use scare quotes because the enclosed word is part of a common phrase (such as creation "science") and the writer disapproves of the term. A writer who uses creation "science" and Creation "Museum" is suggesting that creationism
is pseudoscience
and thus a museum promoting psuedoscience is not a real museum. The word normal denotes that something is proper or not defective. A writer who puts normal in quotation marks may be insinuating that normal is just a point of reference, that it refers to the average. The writer might be arguing that what is normal is not superior in that situation, or that no person could really be called normal in any meaningful way.
Examples:
As political analyst Jonathan Chait writes in The New Republic, "The scare quote is the perfect device for making an insinuation without proving it, or even necessarily making clear what you're insinuating."
), or a slang
usage, or to indicate words or phrases that are descriptive but unusual, colloquial, folksy, startling, humorous, or metaphoric. They may indicate special terminology that should be identified for accuracy's sake as someone else's, for example if a term (particularly a controversial term) pre-dates the writer or represents the views of someone else. A special case of this use of quotes is in the use–mention distinction.
Example:
In the above passage the writer uses scare quotes to indicate that the reported two thousand partners of Nezahualpilli
, poet-astrologer-king of the Mesoamerican state of Texcoco, should not be understood to have been his wives in the same sense that the word wife is used elsewhere.
Some writers prefer italics for this neutral usage, even though italics may easily be mistaken for emphasis. (This has been humorously labeled "scare italics".)
Conversely, neutral quotes may indicate that the word or phrase in quotes has changed in meaning since its usage in the specific instance, especially if the word or phrase has gained a controversial or pejorative meaning.
Example:
Howard's use, which refers to the academic meaning of the word myth, is unrelated to the more recent conservative "gay suicide myth" theory that gay teen suicide rates are over-reported so that gays can claim unrealistic discrimination and obtain special treatment.
Chicago Manual of Style (CMS), 15th edition
acknowledges this type of use but cautions against overuse in section 7.58: "Quotation marks are often used to alert readers that a term is used in a nonstandard, ironic, or other special sense [...] They imply 'This is not my term' or 'This is not how the term is usually applied.' Like any such device, scare quotes lose their force and irritate readers if overused."
to mark a gloss as separate from either the metalanguage
, which is used in the descriptive or theoretical prose, or the object language
, which is rendered in italics. The following sentence illustrates this:
This sentence is about a word in the object language Latin, which appears in italics, and about its counterpart in the gloss language English, enclosed in single quotation marks. The metalanguage, also English, is unaltered.
In spoken conversation, a stand-in for scare quotes is a hand gesture known as air quotes
or finger quotes, which mimics the appearance of quotation marks.
A speaker may alternatively say "quote" before and "unquote" after the words that he wishes to quote ironically, or say "quote unquote" before or after the quoted words or simply pause before and emphasize the parts in quotes. This spoken method is also used for literal and conventional quotes.
Quotation mark
Quotation marks or inverted commas are punctuation marks at the beginning and end of a quotation, direct speech, literal title or name. Quotation marks can also be used to indicate a different meaning of a word or phrase than the one typically associated with it and are often used to express irony...
s placed around a word or phrase to indicate that it does not signify its literal or conventional meaning.
History
Use of the term "scare quotes" appears to have arisen at some point during the first half of the 20th century. Occurrence of the term in academic literature appears as early as the 1950s.Usage
Writers use scare quotes for a variety of reasons. When the enclosed text is a quotation from another source, scare quotes may indicate that the writer does not accept the usage of the phrase (or the phrase itself), that the writer feels its use is potentially ironic, or that the writer feels it is a misnomer. This meaning may serve to distance the writer from the quoted content.If scare quotes are enclosing a word or phrase that does not represent a quotation from another source they may simply serve to alert the reader that the word or phrase is used in an unusual, special, or "non-standard" way or should be understood to include caveats to the conventional meaning.
Alternatively, material in scare quotes may represent the writer's concise (but possibly misleading) paraphrasing, characterization, or intentional misrepresentation of statements, concepts, or terms used by a third party. This may be an expression of sarcasm or incredulity, or it may also represent a rhetoric
Rhetoric
Rhetoric is the art of discourse, an art that aims to improve the facility of speakers or writers who attempt to inform, persuade, or motivate particular audiences in specific situations. As a subject of formal study and a productive civic practice, rhetoric has played a central role in the Western...
al attempt to frame a discussion in the writer's desired (non-standard) terms (e.g. a circumlocution
Circumlocution
Circumlocution is an ambiguous or roundabout figure of speech...
, an apophasis
Apophasis
Apophasis refers, in general, to "mention by not mentioning". Apophasis covers a wide variety of figures of speech.-Apophasis:...
, or an innuendo
Innuendo
An innuendo is a baseless invention of thoughts or ideas. It can also be a remark or question, typically disparaging , that works obliquely by allusion...
).
The term scare quotes may be confusing because the word scare implies provocation, yet the term covers emotionally neutral usage as well. In many cases an author uses scare quotes not to convey alarm, but to signal a semantic quibble.
Quotation of another's words
Example 1:- The invention of coinage by the Lydians lies really in this innovation, which, however simple it may seem to us now, was then of deep political significance. When once a state currency was instituted, the private coinages fell out of use, for no individual banker could compete with the guarantee of the state, and the state would not tolerate imitation of its own types. We may therefore take it that the successive stages in the "invention" of coinage were somewhat as follows: first, the occasional practice of stamping certain weights of metal with marks by which they could be identified; this probably continued in private use for a long period before it was adopted by a state, perhaps first by Lydia; and finally the adoption all over the Greek world of a series of state coinages. The convenience of the "invention" was so obvious as to justify the statement of Herodotus that the Lydians were the first nation of shopkeepers.
-
—A Guide to the Exhibition Illustrating Greek and Roman Life, British Museum
British MuseumThe British Museum is a museum of human history and culture in London. Its collections, which number more than seven million objects, are amongst the largest and most comprehensive in the world and originate from all continents, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture from its...
, 1908
In this passage the writer uses scare quotes around the word invention to express the opinion that Herodotus
Herodotus
Herodotus was an ancient Greek historian who was born in Halicarnassus, Caria and lived in the 5th century BC . He has been called the "Father of History", and was the first historian known to collect his materials systematically, test their accuracy to a certain extent and arrange them in a...
is incorrect in ascribing to the Lydians
Lydians
The Lydians were the inhabitants of Lydia, a region in western Anatolia, who spoke the distinctive Lydian language, an Indo-European language of the Anatolian group....
the role of the inventors of coin
Coin
A coin is a piece of hard material that is standardized in weight, is produced in large quantities in order to facilitate trade, and primarily can be used as a legal tender token for commerce in the designated country, region, or territory....
age. The writer does not begin enclosing the word invention in quotation marks until he begins to express skepticism that its usage was appropriate. In this case, unlike many other applications of scare quotes, the enclosed word is an actual quotation from another source.
Example 2:
- Kazakhstan's famous "130-year-old"—Headline on BBC News web site
The quotation marks around 130-year-old indicate that the news source is reporting but not endorsing the claim.
Other cases
Examples:- creation "science" or Creation "Museum"
- "normal" people
A writer may choose to use scare quotes because the enclosed word is part of a common phrase (such as creation "science") and the writer disapproves of the term. A writer who uses creation "science" and Creation "Museum" is suggesting that creationism
Creationism
Creationism is the religious beliefthat humanity, life, the Earth, and the universe are the creation of a supernatural being, most often referring to the Abrahamic god. As science developed from the 18th century onwards, various views developed which aimed to reconcile science with the Genesis...
is pseudoscience
Pseudoscience
Pseudoscience is a claim, belief, or practice which is presented as scientific, but which does not adhere to a valid scientific method, lacks supporting evidence or plausibility, cannot be reliably tested, or otherwise lacks scientific status...
and thus a museum promoting psuedoscience is not a real museum. The word normal denotes that something is proper or not defective. A writer who puts normal in quotation marks may be insinuating that normal is just a point of reference, that it refers to the average. The writer might be arguing that what is normal is not superior in that situation, or that no person could really be called normal in any meaningful way.
Negative
The effect of using scare quotes is often similar to prepending a skeptical modifier such as so-called or alleged to label the quoted word or phrase, to indicate scorn, sarcasm, or irony. Scare quotes may be used to express disagreement with the original speaker's intended meaning without actually establishing grounds for disagreement or disdain, or without even explicitly acknowledging it. In this type of usage, they are sometimes called "sneer quotes".Examples:
- Liberal: We've heard about these conservatives and their tax "relief".
- Conservative: The liberals have proposed yet another form of "common-sense" gun control.
As political analyst Jonathan Chait writes in The New Republic, "The scare quote is the perfect device for making an insinuation without proving it, or even necessarily making clear what you're insinuating."
Neutral distancing
Enclosing a word or phrase in quotes can also convey a neutral attitude on the part of the writer, while distancing the writer from the terminology in question. The quotes are used to call attention to a neologism, special terminology (jargonJargon
Jargon is terminology which is especially defined in relationship to a specific activity, profession, group, or event. The philosophe Condillac observed in 1782 that "Every science requires a special language because every science has its own ideas." As a rationalist member of the Enlightenment he...
), or a slang
Slang
Slang is the use of informal words and expressions that are not considered standard in the speaker's language or dialect but are considered more acceptable when used socially. Slang is often to be found in areas of the lexicon that refer to things considered taboo...
usage, or to indicate words or phrases that are descriptive but unusual, colloquial, folksy, startling, humorous, or metaphoric. They may indicate special terminology that should be identified for accuracy's sake as someone else's, for example if a term (particularly a controversial term) pre-dates the writer or represents the views of someone else. A special case of this use of quotes is in the use–mention distinction.
Example:
- Moctezuma II was reported to have had two wives and many concubines, by whom he had a total of 150 children. The king of Texcoco was said to have had more than two thousand "wives" by whom he had had 144 children, 11 born of his chief wife.
-
—Bruce G. Trigger, Understanding Early Civilizations (2003)
In the above passage the writer uses scare quotes to indicate that the reported two thousand partners of Nezahualpilli
Nezahualpilli
Nezahualpilli was ruler of the Mesoamerican city-state of Texcoco, elected by the city's nobility after the death of his father, Nezahualcoyotl, in 1472....
, poet-astrologer-king of the Mesoamerican state of Texcoco, should not be understood to have been his wives in the same sense that the word wife is used elsewhere.
Some writers prefer italics for this neutral usage, even though italics may easily be mistaken for emphasis. (This has been humorously labeled "scare italics".)
Conversely, neutral quotes may indicate that the word or phrase in quotes has changed in meaning since its usage in the specific instance, especially if the word or phrase has gained a controversial or pejorative meaning.
Example:
- Billy Joe's story is analyzed in Professor John Howard's history of gays in Mississippi entitled Men Like That: A Queer Southern History as an archetypeArchetypeAn archetype is a universally understood symbol or term or pattern of behavior, a prototype upon which others are copied, patterned, or emulated...
of what Howard calls the "gay suicide myth".
Howard's use, which refers to the academic meaning of the word myth, is unrelated to the more recent conservative "gay suicide myth" theory that gay teen suicide rates are over-reported so that gays can claim unrealistic discrimination and obtain special treatment.
Style guidelines
Style guides generally recommend the avoidance of scare quotes in impartial works, such as in encyclopedia articles or academic discussion.Chicago Manual of Style (CMS), 15th edition
The Chicago Manual of Style
The Chicago Manual of Style is a style guide for American English published since 1906 by the University of Chicago Press. Its 16 editions have prescribed writing and citation styles widely used in publishing...
acknowledges this type of use but cautions against overuse in section 7.58: "Quotation marks are often used to alert readers that a term is used in a nonstandard, ironic, or other special sense [...] They imply 'This is not my term' or 'This is not how the term is usually applied.' Like any such device, scare quotes lose their force and irritate readers if overused."
Formatting
Scare quotes (and other quotation marks used in a special sense) are usually given in the same style (single or double) as those used elsewhere in a work.In linguistics
Single quotation marks are used in linguisticsLinguistics
Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. Linguistics can be broadly broken into three categories or subfields of study: language form, language meaning, and language in context....
to mark a gloss as separate from either the metalanguage
Metalanguage
Broadly, any metalanguage is language or symbols used when language itself is being discussed or examined. In logic and linguistics, a metalanguage is a language used to make statements about statements in another language...
, which is used in the descriptive or theoretical prose, or the object language
Object language
An object language is a language which is the "object" of study in various fields including logic, linguistics, mathematics and theoretical computer science. The language being used to talk about an object language is called a metalanguage...
, which is rendered in italics. The following sentence illustrates this:
- The Latin word homo means 'man'.
This sentence is about a word in the object language Latin, which appears in italics, and about its counterpart in the gloss language English, enclosed in single quotation marks. The metalanguage, also English, is unaltered.
In speech
Air quotes
Air quotes, also called finger quotes or Ersatz quotes are virtual quotation marks formed in the air with one's fingers when speaking. This is typically done with hands held shoulder-width apart and at the eye level of the speaker, with the index and middle fingers on each hand flexing at the...
or finger quotes, which mimics the appearance of quotation marks.
A speaker may alternatively say "quote" before and "unquote" after the words that he wishes to quote ironically, or say "quote unquote" before or after the quoted words or simply pause before and emphasize the parts in quotes. This spoken method is also used for literal and conventional quotes.