Verified answer

They are used at the beginning of questions (¿) and beginning of exclamations (¡). It's pretty much logical, since they're the ?! reversed.

You have to use them when the question/exclamation starts. For example, in your own question:

¿Any Spanish speakers can tell me when to use them?

It's pretty easy, and really useful. You don't have to read until the full stop to realize you were reading a question. From the very beginning you can adapt your intonation, so they're great.

This is the concept.

Finally, you ask

¿would it matter much if I left it out of a sentence?

(See I'm using the symbol as an example)

The answer is that everybody would undertand you, but in any minimumly-formal text, you must include it. You can only exclude it when chatting; otherwise they must be included (although you'd be understood), but the correct is writing them.

¿Should English have this rule too? ¡Yes, for sure! ;)

Most languages using the Latin alphabet indicate a question or an exclamation by adding ? or ! at the end of a sentence. Spanish does this but it also introduces questions and exclamations with the same marks inverted. ¡No me digas! (you don't say!), ¿le crees? (Do you believe him?). The great advantage of the Spanish custom is that you can indicate that something is both a questio and an explanation ¿Es usted tan tonto que le crees! (You aren't so stupid as to actually believe him, are you?)

In the case of a question English often starts with Do you.Example; do you go to church? Spanish ¿Vas a la iglesia? Without the question marks it is a statement ' you go to church ' in speaking the tone of saying it is understood.

You use those inverted marks at the beginnings of sentences which end with those marks looking "normal". In other words, they are additional marks in exclamations or questions. As far as I know no other language uses those additional marks, but you might like to check Portuguese which in many ways is close to Spanish.

You use the inverted question mark and exclamation point at the beginning of the sentence/question/exclamation. So, "What is their name?" would be "¿Cómo se llama?", and "I love you!" would be "¡Te amo!"

See : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_question_an...

I don't understand why the answers provided by GMF-FS and Chi girl received all those thumbs down.. Their answers were very accurate...

I think one reason as to why spanish has upside-down question marks is because in this language almost any sentence can be turned into a question just by adding those signs.

for instance

Juan tiene un Carro... Juan owns a car

¿Juan tiene un carro? Does Juan own a car?

In the english language there's no really need to have upside-down question marks since pretty much all questions in english start with key words such as:

Does

How much

How many

did

etc

Now, I don't understand why other romance languages don't have inverted question marks.... my guess is that in italian or portuguese questions work just as in spanish.

God bless you.

At the beginning of a sentence which ends with an ! or a ?.

They go at the beginning of a sentence to let the reader know what's coming. If you want to write correctly, they're necessary.