A reader asks: Re: the phrase “the place we’re at”. Is it grammatically incorrect and must be “the place we’re”? And did I get the interval and query mark proper?
The phrases “the place we’re at, the place it’s at,” and so forth. are all incorrect in formal English. However personally, I feel individuals make a much bigger deal out of this than they need to, particularly on condition that this complete building arose the 1960, particularly in music lyrics, a few of which stay immensely widespread right now, e.g., this Bob Dylan’s “Like a Rolling Stone, an excerpt from which is:
You used to trip on a chrome horse along with your diplomatWho carried on his shoulder a Siamese catAin’t it arduous if you found thatHe actually wasn’t the place it’s atAfter he took from you every thing he might steal
I can think about sitting with a chilly martini watching a improbable sundown and telling my buddies, “Ya know? That is actually the place it’s at” — realizing that all of them would perceive that I’d not write like that in a enterprise proposal.
To reply your different query, most items of punctuation, i,e., commas and intervals, come earlier than citation marks, the place colons and semicolons come after. Thus, the next are right:
“Vote your conscience,” I advised him.
“That’s proper.”
Right here’s a “rule of thumb”: don’t eat earlier than mattress.
He advised me to not name him “Shirley”; he mentioned he’d punch me if I did.
