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Do I need commas around мол?

For example,

Он говорил, что мол математики занимаются ерундой.

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    it is a stylistic flaw (albeit marginally acceptable) to use both что and мол in this sentence.
    – Quassnoi
    Feb 20, 2017 at 12:37
  • @Quassnoi , or is it possibly a pretend colloquial?
    – bipll
    Feb 21, 2017 at 6:03

1 Answer 1

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Yes, usually it is separated by commas (by the way the term you need to know to make googling easier is "обособление [запятыми]"):

мол, частица -Указывает на то, что говорящий передает чужие слова, чужое мнение или приводит свои слова, сказанные в другое время. Обособляется, сближаясь по значению с вводными словами, указывающими на источник сообщения.

There's another word used in the same context дескать and it is also separated by commas.

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    @brilliant Easy to guess, by the way: «мол» has nothing to do with «занимаются», not being connected to it through describing the same action (relationship of things), therefore it should be separated (the basic principle that works nearly always, without looking up any rule-books).
    – Evgeniy
    Feb 20, 2017 at 12:18
  • there's also the particle "де"
    – VCH250
    Feb 20, 2017 at 19:49
  • @VCH250 good point. My understanding though is that it's reduced form of дескать
    – shabunc
    Feb 20, 2017 at 20:35
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    @shabunc: it's the other way around, дескать is from де
    – Quassnoi
    Feb 21, 2017 at 7:49
  • you mean дескать isn't a verb (wasn't) ?
    – VCH250
    Feb 21, 2017 at 10:53

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