Why not periods? Why doesn’t every sentence in Spanish that isn’t a question or exclamation start with a period floating in the sky?

  • all-knight-party
    88•3 months ago

    I would assume it’s because it leads the reader to what tone to use in a given sentence. The question mark or exclamation point would be useful in tone throughout the whole sentence, but if neither is present in front of the sentence a regular reading tone could be assumed.

    so why add a floating period when nothing being there allows for the same assumption and is much, much simpler and easier?

    • @Catoblepas
      56•3 months ago

      Still learning Spanish but I believe this is correct, because you can insert a question mark into the middle of a sentence as well if the entire sentence isn’t a question.

      Ex:

      I have fish, do you want to cook it?

      Tengo pescado, ¿quieres cocinarlo?

        • @DeltaTangoLima@reddrefuge.comEnglish
          33•3 months ago

          Language is more than just written script and spoken words - grammar is very language specific too. In Spanish, the example above is indeed grammatically correct.

        • @Catoblepas
          19•3 months ago

          Yup! I really like it a lot more than how we do it in English honestly, it’s like quotation marks for a question. It’s very pleasing to me to have something in the sentence clearly highlighting what the question is. If it has any annoyances or drawbacks I’m not at a comprehension level where I’ve run into them.