A List Of Recent Lexical Trends That I Am Against
1) Quotation marks used for emphasis.
The End.
Have you seen this in ads and signs? We have over 15 years of "experience". The "best" in town. We treat your car "right". I think what's going on here is that people for whom English is not a native tongue see quotations being used as a sarcasm indicator, but think that they're being used for sarcastic hyperboyle. Which is to say, they understand that sarcasm is being used, but they think that the quotations are there to add emphasis to the sarcasm, not to indicate the sarcasm itself.
Anyway people, cut it out.
1 comment:
I think in adverts they use quotes to indicate that they're quoting a review or customer comment. Like: Our customers say our hotdogs are "the best in town, a new experience". Then they shorten it to: Our hotdogs are the "best in town", or: Try the "best" hotdogs today!
That way they're not actually claiming to *be* the best in their advertisement, but just quoting someone who said they were the best. Maybe something about advertising laws?
Otoh, maybe it started that way and then other people just started using the quotes because everyone else was.
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