Indirect Questions

Forums: Grammar, Esl, English, Indirect Questions
Email this Topic • Print this Page

My text book ´Grammar Express´ says that an indirect question USUALLY ends in a period point.

Does this mean that an indirect question can still, sometimes, end in a question mark ?

Teacher gave an example using a tag question at the end of the sentence.....

i.e. He asked whether or not we were going, didn´t he ?

BUT .... isn´t the above simply a DIRECT question ?

HELP !!

Topic Stats
Top Replies
Link to this Topic

Type: Question • Score: 4 • Views: 931 • Replies: 7

No top replies

@Wilson502,

There is an indirect question in that sentence, and it is "He asked whether or not we were going". It is followed by a direct question: "didn't he?".

Indirect questions do not end in question marks.

1 Reply

@Wilson502,

Immediately Wil I went to About.com, got this

"We can imagine, for example, a situation in which one person asks another, 'Are you going downtown?' (a direct question). The person addressed does not hear and a bystander says, 'He asked if you were going downtown.' That is an indirect question," maybe the worst possible example however

Here are a couple more terrible examples from another site:

"She asked if she could play pinball."
"The teacher asked who was chewing gum."

But let me try: "I supposed you were having lunch at noon," "But you said this morning that he was well," "I was wondering whether you might stay a while," "I heard that you know someone who could fix my car"

0 Replies

@contrex,

I think that direct and indirect refer specifically to questions that are Direct and Indirect. The latter are softer, more polite, less, well, direct.

Direct question - Where do you live?

Indirect question - Could you tell me where you live?

Direct question - What school does she go to?

Indirect question - Do you know what school she goes to?

2 Replies

@JTT,

Quote:

Indirect question - Could you tell me where you live?

I'm not so sure JTT

http://www.google.ca/#hl=en&sugexp=les%3B&gs_rn=5&gs_ri=psy-ab&pq=major%20issues%20abortion%2C%20gay%20marriage%2C%20and&cp=45&gs_id=54&xhr=t&q=indirect+question+supposed+to+end+with+period&es_nrs=true&pf=p&sclient=psy-ab&oq=indirect+question+supposed+to+end+with+period&gs_l=&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_qf.&fp=46343fe1faec15bb&biw=1255&bih=614

1 Reply

@JTT,

JTT wrote:

I think that direct and indirect refer specifically to questions that are Direct and Indirect. The latter are softer, more polite, less, well, direct.

Maybe we're talking about different things here. What I call an 'indirect question' or 'indirect interrogative' is a sentence that reports a question and ends with a period rather than a question mark. This is the type alluded to in the first post.

Quote:

"Indirect questions do not close with a question mark but with a period. Like direct questions they demand a response, but they are expressed as declarations without the formal characteristics of a question. That is, they have no inversion, no interrogative words, and no special intonation. We can imagine, for example, a situation in which one person asks another, 'Are you going downtown?' (a direct question). The person addressed does not hear and a bystander says, 'He asked if you were going downtown.' That is an indirect question. It requires an answer, but it is expressed as a statement and so is closed by a period, not a query."
(Thomas S. Kane, The New Oxford Guide to Writing. Oxford Univ. Press, 1988)

0 Replies

@dalehileman,

I think you're pretty sure, Dale, and it looks like you and Contrex are right.

1 Reply

@JTT,

JTT you've made my day
How rare is a mite of support in this otherwise contentious contretemps of quotidian devolution

0 Replies

Indirect Questions

Related Topics

Quick Links

My Account

able2know