Quo·ta·tion marks [kʰwɔʊ̯ˈtʰɛɪ̯ʃən mɑːk] are a set of symbols surrounding a quote. Their shapes vary from language to language. First there are the
inverted commas, which can be either single or double, and either dumb or smart.
‘Single’, “Double”; "Dumb", “Smart”
Dumb quotes look the same on either side, and this was the only way to do it with a typewriter. But
smart quotes (or
typographic quotes) look different, depending on whether they are
opening (or beginning) the quote or
closing (ending) it. And these different quotes also have language-specific forms. English, for example, uses 6-shaped opening quotes and 9-shaped closing quotes:
“English”
In German these are opposite and the opening quotes are low, resembling commas.
„Deutsch“
And then there is the Swedish way...
”Svenska”
Pretty dumb, if you ask this author. But wait it gets worse. Read on to see what Finnish does.
