That's between you and I

[Goodheart]

Should that drive me crazy? I hear it more and more.

How about we just retire the word "me"? Agree with I?

By the way, my punctuation in my question above is incorrect, as far as I know. Standard practice is to put the question mark inside the quotation marks, like so: How about we just retire the word "me?" Doesn't make much sense to I.

[Mossfern]

1. Drives me crazy too.

Or should I rephrase that to "Drives I crazy?"
Don't understand the standard placement of the question mark within the quote because "Drives I crazy" isn't a question.

[Alliepoo]

2. I'm old and school was a long time ago (I'm talking b&w TV!)

But I could swear that we were taught that the question mark goes outside the quotation marks.

[Sanity Claws]

5. The American rule is that the question mark goes inside the quotation marks

See https://www.grammarly.com/blog/quotation-marks/
Where were you educated?

[wackadoo wabbit]

26. This is incorrect

Unless it is part of the quoted material, the question mark goes outside of the quotation marks.

Source: I'm a former magazine editor.

[wackadoo wabbit]

28. Here's something more authoritative than my personal knowledge

From the CMS:

The question mark should be placed inside the quotation marks, parentheses, or brackets only when it is part of the quoted or parenthetical matter. [emphasis mine]

[TheBlackAdder]

32. The problem is, English is an organic language and writing styles vary by which one used.

.

As a linguistics professor taught, the language can be relaxed, because as long as the message is delivered and understood clearly, in whatever garbled method, then the language was effective.

People can nit pick all day about punctuation and styles, such as the MLA which changes every year. I used to have to write papers and adapt the writing styles each year to match the current MLA guidelines. Primarily there are the APA, MLA & Chicago styles that are preferred by different academic departments. And when taking courses, some semesters I would have to write in all three styles, depending on the class and professor's preference.

In summary: Writing Styles are bullshit, and effectively a cottage industry to sell books and updates.

.

[TreasonousBastard]

6. It depends. The mark goes after the question, whatever the question is...

He asked me "Do you know this?"

Did you hear him say "Screw this"?

Or at least that makes sense.

[Mossfern]

8. I was taught that too.

I remember when the first family in the neighborhood got a color TV.

[Laelth]

3. It certainly bugs me.

But nobody controls English. There’s no way to banish this common case error from the language.

-Laelth

[Foolacious]

4. US-style punctuation goes by the logic of the statement, EXCEPT...

for periods and commas; those always go inside the quote marks. Just between yourself and Iself.

[Goodheart]

9. That doesn't make much sense.

You're saying this is correct:

He said "give me the money," and I happily obliged.

????

We need a new Punctuation Convention. Masks required.

[Foolacious]

24. Yes, that's what I'm saying.

And yes, it doesn't make much sense. The British and ostensibly Canadian style is to put the punctuation inside the quotes if the clause inside the quotes actually has that punctuation even if not quoted, and outside otherwise. That makes more sense. Being a dual Canadian/American, I tend to use the Canadian style (although it's begun to morph into the US style).

US & Canada:
He asked, "Will you give me the money?"

US & Canada:
Did he say, "Give me the money"?

US:
He said, "Give me the money."

Canada:
He said, "Give me the money".

[Goodheart]

25. Yet another reason I should move to Canada. :)

[eppur_se_muova]

7. I use programmers' punctation rules.

All quotes must be paired, and the second quote closes a clause; punctuation inside quote marks only applies to the quoted string; punctuation at the end of the sentence applies to the whole sentence.

So I would write a phrase such as:

Did you ask "What's up?"?

Where the first ? indicates I am quoting a question, and the second that I am embedding the quote in my own question. Likewise with periods and exclamation marks, and in any order. Ms Turabian would not approve, but I've always disagreed on this one, and who died and made her queen anyway?

[Goodheart]

11. There you go!

Makes sense to me, but I think you'd get get marks off in an English class. LOL

[TreasonousBastard]

10. Ah, yes-- we no longer teach students sentence diagramming, so they have no idea about...

noun declensions and the nominative and accusative (objective) cases.

Imagine if we spoke Latin, and had to deal with ablative and dative cases, too.

[Goodheart]

12. Sentence diagramming was good stuff, really.

[TreasonousBastard]

13. I actually enjoyed it, and you learned a lot about language.

[GoCubsGo]

14. We should probably retire "fewer" along with it.

Because, I'm hearing "less" instances where it's supposed to be used, but isn't.

[Goodheart]

15. "Less" where "fewer" should be used drives me NUTS!

[Goodheart]

16. While I'm at it, I keep hearing about trump's "cognitive test".

Shouldn't that be "cognition test", instead? How can a test be cognitive?

[DavidDvorkin]

17. I hate it

But as for the punctuation, it depends on the country. In America, it's standard to put the question mark inside the quotation marks, but in many other parts of the English-speaking world, in this case, it would be outside because it's not part of the quotation.

[wackadoo wabbit]

29. No, it's not

In the U.S., the question mark goes outside the quotation marks unless the question mark is part of the quoted material.

Please see my posts upthread.

[DavidDvorkin]

30. Sorry, you're right

I was thinking of commas and periods. I had to relearn where to place those when I moved to the US.

[wackadoo wabbit]

31. No worries

I can imagine what a pain it was having to relearn the American system.

The U.S. system of putting periods and commas always inside the quotation marks is highly illogical. Truth be told, I wish we'd use the more sensible convention used by the rest of the world.

[ananda]

18. Your punctuation is correct.

If it's just one word or phrase, the quotes do not include
the whole sentence.

[Backseat Driver]

19. Question everything, LOL!

Here's the rules on how to use question marks; be sure to also view the link at the very end regarding terminal punctuation. I believe you used the question mark appropriately in your post because "me" is italicized as the specific word to be acted upon as the suggested action of the whole sentence.

https://www.thepunctuationguide.com/question-mark.html

BTW, there are rules about the how and when to use the idiomatic "how about" as well.

https://www.espressoenglish.net/difference-between-how-about-and-what-about/

Just between you and me, lol, just because you hear it more and more often does not magically turn using I into proper usage in that instance.

Here's a question for You, the All Powerful I." Are you part of the selfish "ME" generation that wants to abandon punctuation and grammar rules as a separatist, elite power play? Me bows to your infinite superiority in case you name me as a clandestine member of the grammar police.

I'm really just suggesting resources to back up correct usage of the question mark and asking other questions as a friend because I was once told not to use "I seen" because it was bad grammar. That friend said I'd forever be marked as uneducated. Forever after that scolding, I winced whenever I heard it used by others, among many other tabboo ways to speak; hence, my bias grows stronger about people in the same way suggested by that friend and yet most feel it rude to point out others' faults directly to their face, so I digress about whether or not you've sinned by mere suggestion of eliminating "me" from the English language, LOL! Actually, I think I'd figure out your meaning with whichever proper noun or pronoun you choose to converse or put to paper. There are far more important issues that need to be resolved where two or three gather together.

[Goodheart]

21. At this point I'm wondering why "I" and "me" ever became separate words in the first place.

Caveman: "I have a new rock."
Next caveman: "That rock belongs to ME!"
Caveman: "Who the fuck is "ME"?

[yellowwoodII]

35. Please

That should be "Here are the rules..."

[Backseat Driver]

39. Right you are! Mea Culpa

[mantis49]

20. I'm with you!

n/t

[Shanti Mama]

22. Drives me NUTS

I find that people are using I where it should be me and then visa versa.

I wish my kids had learned sentence diagramming. I tried to teach me son when he was struggling with French. He eventually switched to Japanese and found it much easier!

I understand that English is a living language, evolving all the time. Still I long for "my" good old days. My mom's gold old days were related to choose instead of pick, which was what you do to fruit. And meat being cooked, not done. And Winston tastes good AS a cig should. etc

[Leith]

23. Yes, I wince when I read or hear it

But.... if people would just form plurals withOUT a fucking apostrophe, my blood pressure would go back down to normal.

[0rganism]

27. i've had to let go of the "begs the question" vs. "raises the question" irritation

admittedly it still bothers me a little when it happens, but my grouching on the topic made absolutely no difference to anyone.

i recommend proceeding as before, accept that it happens, just try to glean the underlying meaning and move on.

getting pissed over grammar generally doesn't help, and probably raises your blood pressure. do yourself a favor and let go. life is too short.

[tblue37]

33. No, the question mark belongs outside the quotation marks in that sentence, just as you have it.

My article on the issue:

"Quotation Marks: Where Do the Commas and Periods Go--and Why?"

http://grammartips.homestead.com/inside.html

[Goodheart]

36. A lot of that makes no sense.

I'm going to punctuate LOGICALLY from now, regardless of any stupid American conventions.

[tblue37]

37. The British use logical punctuation. The U.S. insists on it exceptionalism. nt

[DFW]

34. It drives me crazy, too

I don‘t know when it got started. Doors fans, maybe? Jim Morrison once sang it in a song called „Touch Me,“ and he died in 1971.

Same thing goes for using an apostrophe to form a plural. I have no idea where that came from. People who do that never learned it in any school on this planet, and yet it is very widespread. Be prepared for „comment‘s and complaint‘s from grammar Nazi‘s.“

[panader0]

38. I once had a dangling participle but the doctor cut it off I.