53

I couldn't find a "grammar help" community so I thought this might be a good place to pose this question. Sorry for asking something that boils down to "please help me with my homework" but I'm at a loss. I'm supposed to be using MLA format.

Here's the text I'm quoting:

"While recognizing the critical potential of the dystopic imagination, this volume examines it as a form of urban representation; the modern city, after all, appears to be an instantiation of a dystopic form of society."

Here's my sentence:

Prakash notes the utility of dystopian media, stating "this volume examines it as a form of urban representation; the modern city, after all, appears to be an instantiation of a dystopic form of society." (3)

Is this right? Should I have the period at the end of the parentheses? I tried looking through my textbook and a few online articles but I couldn't find an example with a parenthetical citation and a quote that includes a period. Thanks for the help!

top 23 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[-] I_Fart_Glitter@lemmy.world 30 points 5 months ago

Period comes after the parentheses. https://guides.libraries.psu.edu/mlacitation/intext

Direct quote:

One study found that “the listener's familiarity with the topic of discourse greatly facilitates the interpretation of the entire message” (Gass and Varonis 85).

[-] BarrelAgedBoredom@lemm.ee 10 points 5 months ago

Thank you! This was driving me nuts lol

[-] Nemo@midwest.social 13 points 5 months ago

Wow, I really want to correct the original authors's grammar. Why use "instantiation" instead of "instance"?

That's what [sic] is for. Well, not for correcting, but for dunking on.

[-] Etterra@lemmy.world 6 points 5 months ago

I've never heard it put that way, and you're not wrong. I'm pretty sure it was intended to mean "that's not our typo, we're just quoting the idiot."

[-] BarrelAgedBoredom@lemm.ee 14 points 5 months ago

Stuffy, self-important academic tomes require big words to make simple points

[-] machinin@lemmy.world 4 points 5 months ago

My personal pet peeve is people using "societal" when "social" is just as appropriate.

[-] techt@lemmy.world 2 points 5 months ago

Mine is sate vs satiate

[-] bionicjoey@lemmy.ca 3 points 5 months ago

I can see the distinction mattering. "Instantiation" implies an act. Something did the instantiating. "Instance" doesn't have the same implication of an agent.

[-] Drusas@kbin.run 4 points 5 months ago

This isn't what you're asking, but since your question has been answered, and this might actually be helpful for you:

Sorry for asking something that boils down to "please help me with my homework" but I'm at a loss.

You should put a comma before "but". Like so:

Sorry for asking something that boils down to "please help me with my homework", but I'm at a loss.

A comma is required when you are separating clauses which would be complete sentences. "I'm at a loss" is a complete sentence, so there should be a comma before the "but".

[-] spongebue@lemmy.world 9 points 5 months ago

This is a rule about English I absolutely despise and generally refuse to follow (makes me twitch as a programmer), but shouldn't the punctuation (the comma you added) go inside the quotes?

[-] fakeman_pretendname@feddit.uk 3 points 5 months ago

As far as I'm aware, in English, the punctuation goes outside the quotes, unless it's part of the original quote.

In American, the punctuation goes inside the quotes, even if it's not part of the sentence being quoted.

I'm unsure of the habits of other English-speaking countries.

[-] spongebue@lemmy.world 5 points 5 months ago

Ahhh ok. I speak American. Good reason to find another country I guess.

[-] Drusas@kbin.run 2 points 5 months ago

American English puts punctuation inside the quotes. I'm an American, but I think it makes more sense the way the British do it, so I switched to their way.

[-] expr@programming.dev 2 points 5 months ago

It depends on the country. This is true in American English and it's what we teach in schools. In British English (which, in my experience, is what most ESL learners outside the US end up learning), they go outside the quotes. Source.

[-] Drusas@kbin.run 1 points 5 months ago

My experience is that EFL learners tend to be taught American English, but that might just be in Japan.

[-] loaExMachina@sh.itjust.works 1 points 5 months ago

I'm French and we mostly mearn British English in school. But then again, we're very close to GB and Japan is very Americanized (occupation and all that). I think a country that's halfway between them and has no privileged relationship with either should step into this conversation. Like Russia, Mongolia or Kazakhstan. However, as you might have noticed from the previous sentence, I refuse to use the Oxford comma because we don't use it on French and it doesn't make sense.

[-] Drusas@kbin.run 1 points 5 months ago

I would be very interested in the experiences of people learning on countries which are neither European nor especially attached to the US.

[-] frazorth@feddit.uk 2 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

Not American here. Why would you put the punctuation inside the quotes unless you are quoting punctuation? Unless I misunderstood what you mean.

For example:

Bob wrote "this is amazing!".

Bob used an exclamation point, so I quoted an exclamation. If it is the end of my sentence then I use a full stop, if I quote it then it would imply the end of their sentence even though it wasn't.

Frazorth is amazing when he speaks, as I never knew someone could be quite so incoherent.

Would be quoted as

Bob said "Frazorth is amazing."

It distorts the context.

[-] raef@lemmy.world 2 points 5 months ago

Question was answered, but I'm wondering about the citation. What is the number three in parenthesis? MLA is name of source and possibly page number.

[-] BarrelAgedBoredom@lemm.ee 1 points 5 months ago

Its the page number, the author and source were mentioned in the sentence previous to this one

[-] raef@lemmy.world 2 points 5 months ago

Ah, right. I completely overlooked that. Since it was such a low number, I thought it might be a numbered source

[-] some_guy 2 points 5 months ago

You might want to check out a book called The Elements of Style. I believe it teaches punctuation and maybe grammar.

this post was submitted on 14 Jul 2024
53 points (92.1% liked)

No Stupid Questions

36055 readers
440 users here now

No such thing. Ask away!

!nostupidquestions is a community dedicated to being helpful and answering each others' questions on various topics.

The rules for posting and commenting, besides the rules defined here for lemmy.world, are as follows:

Rules (interactive)


Rule 1- All posts must be legitimate questions. All post titles must include a question.

All posts must be legitimate questions, and all post titles must include a question. Questions that are joke or trolling questions, memes, song lyrics as title, etc. are not allowed here. See Rule 6 for all exceptions.



Rule 2- Your question subject cannot be illegal or NSFW material.

Your question subject cannot be illegal or NSFW material. You will be warned first, banned second.



Rule 3- Do not seek mental, medical and professional help here.

Do not seek mental, medical and professional help here. Breaking this rule will not get you or your post removed, but it will put you at risk, and possibly in danger.



Rule 4- No self promotion or upvote-farming of any kind.

That's it.



Rule 5- No baiting or sealioning or promoting an agenda.

Questions which, instead of being of an innocuous nature, are specifically intended (based on reports and in the opinion of our crack moderation team) to bait users into ideological wars on charged political topics will be removed and the authors warned - or banned - depending on severity.



Rule 6- Regarding META posts and joke questions.

Provided it is about the community itself, you may post non-question posts using the [META] tag on your post title.

On fridays, you are allowed to post meme and troll questions, on the condition that it's in text format only, and conforms with our other rules. These posts MUST include the [NSQ Friday] tag in their title.

If you post a serious question on friday and are looking only for legitimate answers, then please include the [Serious] tag on your post. Irrelevant replies will then be removed by moderators.



Rule 7- You can't intentionally annoy, mock, or harass other members.

If you intentionally annoy, mock, harass, or discriminate against any individual member, you will be removed.

Likewise, if you are a member, sympathiser or a resemblant of a movement that is known to largely hate, mock, discriminate against, and/or want to take lives of a group of people, and you were provably vocal about your hate, then you will be banned on sight.



Rule 8- All comments should try to stay relevant to their parent content.



Rule 9- Reposts from other platforms are not allowed.

Let everyone have their own content.



Rule 10- Majority of bots aren't allowed to participate here.



Credits

Our breathtaking icon was bestowed upon us by @Cevilia!

The greatest banner of all time: by @TheOneWithTheHair!

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS