Achilles, I see you are quite right -- although I still would not change the advice I gave to Roberto.
From Charles Darling's Guide to Grammar and Style:
In the United States, we use single-quote marks [ ‘ ' ] to enclose quoted material (or the titles of poems, stories, articles) within other quoted material.
"'Design' is my favorite poem," he said.
Ralph Ellison recalls the Golden Age of Jazz this way: "It was itself a texture of fragments, repetitive, nervous, not fully formed; its melodic lines underground, secret and taunting; its riffs jeering—'Salt peanuts! Salt peanuts!'"
British practice, again, is quite different. In fact, single-quote marks and double-quote marks are apt to be reversed in usage. Instructors in the U.S. should probably take this into account when reading papers submitted by students from other parts of the globe.
Now, why wouldn't I change and/or modify my advice (to follow the strictly American system)?
1) After all these years of resistance, I have finally given up following the more logical English system of placing commas and periods outside quotation marks, in favor of the American system of placing them inside. Once one has "gone American," one should go all the way, I think. Editors will insist on it, anyway, so why fight the inevitable?
2) Even more important: the English have not standardized their approach. Note that little word "apt": "...are apt to be reversed."
Curious as to the origin of the semi-divergence of English and American practice in this regard, I took a look Fowler's The King's English (3rd edition, 1930). Turns out that in those days, the English observed the same practice we did: they placed the double quotes around the full quotation, and the singles around a quotation within the quotation. But! it was being challenged by the reverse system, touted as more logical -- although why this was supposed to be more logical, I can't understand. In any event, the 1930 Fowler chooses no sides in the matter.
The Fowler-Gowers Modern English Usage (Second Edition, 1965), however, does, coming out unequivocally, and ferociously, for the newfangled variant:
We hope that The man who says 'I shall write to "The Times" tonight' will ultimately prevail over The man who says "I shall write to 'The Times' tonight".
Well, Mr. Gowers, you had better write to The Times tonight, because we -- we unkultchured Yanks -- have prevailed! At least on this side of the Atlantic! Hahahahahahahahahahahahaha!!
But there is one VERY important exception to the rule, which I completely forgot about. So, Roberto, please pay attention.
One further exception, according to the Chicago Manual of Style: in philosophical discourse, key concepts may be set apart with single-quote marks. When such concepts are set off in this way, periods and commas go outside the single-quote marks:
Sartre's treatment of 'being', as opposed to his treatment of 'non-being', has been thoroughly discussed in Kaufmann's book.
webster.commnet.edu
In other words, you have to adhere to two British rules: 1) single quotes, 2) period outside quotation marks.
Looks kind of stupid immediately reverting to the American system of punctuation for the rest of the text. But it's good to be reminded of the fact that "rules" are often completely arbitrary, with little or no regard for logic.
Joan
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