In this mini episode, you will learn the strange and useful phrase “quote, unquote.”
Episode 466 of the Everybody ESL podcast is a mini episode that teaches you the strange and useful phrase “quote, unquote.” Send your questions about English and your comments and suggestions to EverybodyESL@gmail.com. (And let me know if you’d like to record the introduction to a future episode.)
Intro
“This is Theodore Freeman, from Toronto, Canada. And you’re listening to Everybody ESL.”
Welcome to episode 466 of Everybody ESL, the podcast for everybody who wants to improve their English, practice their English, or just learn more English. My name is Ben, and I have a mini episode for you today, where I am going to teach you about one English topic. You can subscribe to the Everybody ESL podcast at Apple podcasts and wherever you find your podcasts. If you like Everybody ESL, leave it a good review so other people can find out about it too. And if you have any questions, comments, or suggestions for me, please send an email to EverybodyESL@gmail.com. Okay! Let’s get on with this mini episode.
The episode
In this episode, I am going to teach you an interesting phrase. The phrase is “quote, unquote.” Quote, unquote. That’s spelled q-u-o-t-e, comma, u-n-q-u-o-t-e. Quote, unquote.
Have you ever heard someone use this phrase, “quote, unquote”? You probably will not see this phrase in written English. I think this is something you will usually hear in spoken English.
We use the phrase “quote, unquote” when we are using words that someone else used, when we are quoting someone else.
We use “quote, unquote” when we want to make it clear that we are giving someone else’s words or someone else’s opinion about something.
Let me give you a quick example that I think will help you understand this phrase.
Let’s say that I am talking about a friend of mine, and I say this about my friend: “As you know, he is a quote, unquote genius.” He is a quote, unquote genius. What would that mean? Why would I say it that way? I might say, “Quote, unquote genius” as a way of saying, “I don’t think this person is a genius. I’m just saying someone else’s word,” or “I’m just giving you someone else’s opinion. Someone else called my friend a genius. That’s not really what I think.”
If I thought my friend was a genius, I would probably just say, “My friend is a genius.” But if I say my friend is a quote, unquote genius, I am telling you I don’t really see it this way. I’m quoting somebody else. I’m using somebody else’s word, or I’m giving you somebody else’s opinion.
This is how you will hear people use the phrase “quote, unquote.” They will use it before other words to mean “This is not my word, or these are not my words or opinions. This is what someone else said or what someone else thinks.”
Maybe in this case about my friend, the genius, or my friend, the quote, unquote genius, what I’m trying to say is something like, “Well, you know, my friend is always saying that he is a genius. I don’t really think he’s a genius, but he thinks very highly of himself, and he refers to himself as a genius.” So I might call him a “quote, unquote genius.” I don’t think that, but he thinks that, or someone else thinks that.
Even though this phrase is “quote, unquote,” you might hear it in a different form. You might hear people say “quote, quote” instead of “quote, unquote.” In my example, you might hear someone say, “My friend is a quote, quote genius.”
In both of these cases, we are using this expression to stand for quotation marks. You know, those punctuation marks that we put around speech that we are quoting. Someone else’s speech, we often put inside quotation marks.
And so we can refer to that as “quote, unquote,” meaning the first and the last quotation marks. Quote, unquote, or sometimes people just say “quote, quote.” It means the same thing.
And that is “quote, unquote,” an interesting and useful phrase that I think you should know.
Outro
This is the end of episode 466 of Everybody ESL. Remember: If you have any questions about English, or if you have comments for me, or if you would like to record an introduction that I can play at the beginning of future episodes—the same way Theodore recorded the introduction you heard at the beginning of this episode—send an email to EverybodyESL@gmail.com. I’ll be back soon with a new episode. And until then, keep going, keep practicing, and keep learning. I’ll see you soon. Goodbye!