Rules of Dialogue

The character sketch from this week was a chance to experiment with bringing a character to life using showing language. Letting a character speak is another very effective way of bringing a character to life on the page.
I'd like you to review the readings from last week (the Dillard has very little but the Rodriguez essay has enough to make some good conclusions) for examples of dialogue. How is it punctuated; where does the punctuation belong? For every line of dialogue, is it made clear who the speaker is? When is it ok to not explain who does the speaking?

I'd like you to discover the rules for using quotation marks to punctuate dialoge. To discover these rules, review the reading you've been assigned: "Broken Places" and the "American Childhood" and "Always Running" are the examples I'd like you to base your examination.

Where do periods and commas belong?

How do you handle new speakers?

What happens when two people are talking-- how often do you need to tell the reader who is speaking?

What is allowed in dialogue (what types of terms? how do you show accent? how do you use dialogue to bring the character to life?)?


In this discussion board post, explain the rules of dialogue from an examination of published stories. Do not paraphrase or quote your grammar handbook, figure these rules out for yourself (and explain them here).

After you've tried to figure out these rules yourself, you're free to refer to the Purdue OWL:  https://owl.english.purdue.edu/