Reader’s question:

Even the quote unquote realistic movies don't show very realistic violence. Could you explain “quote unquote”?

My comments:

Putting it another way: Even the realistic, quote unquote, movies don’t show very realistic violence.

The speaker is merely putting the word “realistic” in quote marks in speech.

In writing, you have “” as quote marks. In speech, you say quote (for “, beginning of the quote) unquote (for “, end of quote).

When you put something in quote marks, of course, you mean to say it ain’t necessarily so.

In the above example, the speaker means that the so called “realistic” movies are NOT realistic.

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本文仅代表作者本人观点，与本网立场无关。欢迎大家讨论学术问题，尊重他人，禁止人身攻击和发布一切违反国家现行法律法规的内容。

Zhang Xin has been with China Daily since 1988, when he graduated from Beijing Foreign Studies University. Write him at: zhangxin@chinadaily.com.cn, or raise a question for potential use in a future column.