“I often see students use single quotations marks to indicate 'jokes' or 'ironic distance,'” said the professor. “This is incorrect for two reasons. First, in American English, one only uses single quotation marks withing quoted speech. Second, in academic writing (and journalism, too), a reader who sees quotation marks around a term will expect that you are citing somebody's exact words.” Thus, you are introducing an anachronism if you claim “Shakespeare is known for his 'bad-assed' use of slang.” You are correct but obscure if you write “Shakespeare's sympathetic presentation of the imperfection of 'all flesh and blood' is one of the reasons his plays are still performed after 400 years.”

You would be correct and informative if you quote somebody who wrote, “Shakespeare presented human imperfections with sympathy, as when the clown tells his mistress, 'I have been, madam, a wicked creature, as you and all flesh and blood are' (All's Well that Ends Well I.iii).” Note that if these examples are not isloated with quotation marks, but part of the body of a paper, all the single quotes would change to double quotes.

Shakespeare presented human imperfections with sympathy, as when the clown tells his mistress, “I have been, madam, a wicked creature, as you and all flesh and blood are” (All's Well that Ends Well I.iii). The clown's familarity with his mistress is a crowd-pleasing characteristic of Elizabethan work. Shakespeare's works contain elements designed to please both royal patrons and the groundlings -- the lower-class audience members who appreciated quick-witted servants as much as they enjoyed stage battles and slapstick comedy.

Another important use of quotation marks involves quoted speech in fiction.

• Use double quotes to indicate quoted speech.
• Start a new paragraph for each new speaker.
• Beginning fiction writers often overdo the speech labels that indicate who is speaking and how they are delivering their lines. Cues within the quoted dialogue are often enough.

     "Mister! Oh, mister! Sorry, did I scare you? Why are you throwing all those purses into the dumpster?"
     "Oh, uh... yuh might say I don't need 'em, seein' as how they're empty now."
     "Really? Because my mommy has a purse just like that one. Except her purse doesn't have red on it. Have you seen her around? Hey, wow -- is that gun real?"