While on vacation during the first week of summer, I came across an advertisement for the H1N1 Vaccine on the back of a coach bus. It stated “Get your ‘free’ H1N1 vaccine today!”
This begs the question, does putting quotation marks around “Free” (but not as a quotation, of course) serve any function or purpose? Such as:
All these hot dogs are “free”.
We (i.e. the creators of Pain in The English) developed a series of iPhone apps to teach preschool kids how to recognize letters and words. (My wife developed the characters and I did the coding.) Our own 4-year old daughter has been enjoying them. They are now available on Apple's App Store. You can search for "bitskis" on your iPhone, or visit the official website at bitskis.com.
If you have kids and own an iPhone, please check it out. It's $2.
The hot dogs were free, as in a third party could take them but they weren’t free to produce. Same with the H1N1 vaccine. Unless the hot dogs or vaccine appeared out of the air, then they aren’t literally free.
Often, putting a single word in quotes in this manner expresses doubt or irony. A free vacation is one that costs you nothing. A “free” vacation is one that includes extra “processing fees”, etc., perhaps hidden in the fine print.
Sometimes quotes are used simply for emphasis. This usage is non-standard and considered by many to be incorrect as it can be easily confused for irony or sarcasm, sometimes with humorous results. Using italics, boldface, etc., is preferred.
For a good presentation on various uses of “out of place” quotation marks, see:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quotation_mark
especially the paragraphs on irony, signaling unusual usage, use-mention distinction, and emphasis (incorrect usage).
There is a popular blog entirely devoted to this issue.