Quotation (speech) marks to indicate alleged or so-called

Free grammar tips, lessons and tests

Recommended purchases

This site: Grammar Monster on line Daily tips with Grammar Monster's gadget Daily tips with Grammar Monster on Twitter  The best grammar reference books Grammar Monster off line The only grammar checker we'll endorse
Common grammar errors
Easily confused words
Grammar terms & definitions
Grammar tests
Grammar lessons
Search this site


 Home

Search
 

Glossary
of Terms

Common
Errors

FAQs

Grammar
Chat

Download

Grammar
Checker


 
Use quotation marks to indicate 'alleged' or 'so-called'.
 


Quotations for 'So-Called'

Quotation marks can be used to indicate 'supposedly', 'allegedly' or 'so-called'.

Examples:

Peter's "mates" left him on the path to die.
(so-called mates)

The sheep were noticeably stressed. It must've been a very big "cat".  
(In this example, the quotation marks play two roles. They are showing a
quotation of somebody who claimed the culprit was a cat and infer so-called or
alleged too.)


                    "rescue" - correct (it's not a real rescue)
                                              (magazine article)

Using his father's equipment, Alexander found over 50,000 bacteria on a "clean" chopping board.
(so-called clean)
JUST SAY IT ONCE 

Quotation marks can be used to indicate 'alleged' or 'so-called'. There is no need to use these actual words when using quotation marks for this purpose.

Peter's so-called "mates" left him on the path to freeze.
(In this example, "so-called" and the quotation marks are doing the same job. This is known as tautology.)

Peter's so-called mates left him on the path to freeze.
Peter's "mates" left him on the path to freeze.
 
Recently, I booted out a bunch of supposed "professionals" and finished the job myself.  I ended up having to redo half their work because it was so awful.

supposed "professionals"
"professionals"

supposed professionals

(magazine article)

Associated lessons:
 
Colon or comma before quotation (speech) marks?
Punctuation inside or outside quotation (speech) marks?
Quotation (speech) marks for ships, plays, books, etc.
Double or single quotation (speech) marks?
 
 

Grammar Monster © | Copyright Registration Number: 226604 | All rights reserved