CRUCIAL QUESTION FOR THE INTERNETS

[highlyeccentric]

Dear Internets: I am very fond of you, and the interesting things you do with the English language. Emoticons, for example: far from a blight upon the page, I find them a most useful addition to text-based communication.

As I'm sure you know, O Internets, there are strict rules of English punctuation. Some of them, such as those governing the relationship of punctuation marks in series, can be a matter for heated debate.

So I must ask you: in a well-constructed sentence, shall the smiley face be placed before, or after, the full stop? If one places a smiley face inside of a parenthetical statement at the end of a sentence, how does one deal with the resulting overdose of punctuation (your sentence will look like this :))?

Please deliver a rule at once, the ambiguity is causing me distress :(. (?)

Yours,

Amy

Comments

[peoppenheimer]

Back in the day (before the expression “back in the day” was coined, as far as I know), the first occurrences of the smiley, which indicated that something was being said with other than a straightforward assertoric force, was, if included in a parenthesis (that is, a parenthetical remark), so constructed as to include the closing parenthesis (if the parenthesis was set off with parentheses rather than with, say, commas or dashes). Thus: “(this is very serious :)”.

[sunflowerp]

IME (with dialup BBSes, from '92 on; since dialups were predominantly local, YMMV w/r/t geography as well as chronology), this was not usually intentional. But, since the conventions of a language generally derive organically, from usage in practice, it could be argued that, by sheer commonality of unintentional omission of the closing parenthesis, it counts as grammatical.

W/r/t the original question, I personally consider the emoticon to be most properly placed before punctuation, somewhat akin the way punctuation is (usually, but with some exceptions) placed before a closing quotation mark. The likely exception would be if the emoticon referred not just to that sentence or clause, but to previous sentences/clauses. If an immediately consecutive duplication of character (most commmonly mouth, closing parenthesis) occurs, and the writer dislikes this, it may be resolved by putting a space between the two characters.

Since modemspeak/netspeak/GeekSpeak is a colloquial dialect rather than a formal one (especially in realtime-chat forms), the grammatical rules tend to be fluid rather than firm; specific styles will vary based on the individual user's own esthetic and grammatical sense (or lack thereof).

(Thanks, Amy - an opportunity to be pseudopedantic was exactly what the moment called for, for me... the moment being the bottom of the first glass of solstice-celebratory wine.)

Sunflower

[foxfirefey]

Can I metaquotes this?

[highlyeccentric]

Absolutely!

[foxfirefey]

Done!

[phrasemuffin]

See, I always use emoticons INSTEAD of fullstops if they come at the end of a sentence, and then begin with a capital :) Like this. It makes things easier for me. Occasionally I will fullstop-space-smile though, especially if it's for a broader application of the smile. :) (... So mainly at the end of a paragraph, which that now isn't really. But while we're in here: :) )

The other option though when you have the parenthcrisis is to D - (crisis averted! :D)

I never ever EVER replace the closing parenthesis with an emoticon. It looks massively dodgy and can be quite confusing as to whether I mean to close with the emoticon orkeep going until the next.

[highlyeccentric]

Parenthecrisis.

BEST WORD EVER.

[owl]

Here via metaquotes. As a programmer, I feel nervous if I do not close an open parenthesis, as though my text will fail to compile without it. Also as a programmer I have a high tolerance for lots or bits of punctuation in a row (have you seen Perl? ;))

Your layout is really gorgeous, btw.

[highlyeccentric]

Thank you! It's not mine - I nabbed it from dw_layouts, and apparently I didn't actually make a note anywhere of WHOSE work it was. *facepalm* My bad! Its title is "elegant grunge", I know that much.

[lian]

Whenever I close parentheses and have a smily preceding, I just chnge 'em to square brackets. [like so: :)]

yes, I know. but it's a working solution for me :)

(as for smilies & punctuation, no hard & fast rules because I use it like a smile in f2f conversation -- sometimes I smile in the middle of a sentence, sometimes after I finished a thought...)

[waywren]

I ... usually stick them after the closing punctuation, but I tend to use a different style of emoticon. ^^ <--like that. ^_^ n.n

Those were three kinds of smile, none of which look particularly like anything English is used to. Parenthecrisis averted! n.n v (smile victory sign!)

Also, your delight in grammar fills me with joy. May I follow you around by circling you? <3

[highlyeccentric]

You may, indeed, circle me. (What a nifty new verb! I like it much better than "friend", and it's much more personable than "subscribe" or "add"...)

:D