Question

Since the female speaker discussed in her poem is "different", she is criticized...

Does the comma after different belong there? Or does it go inside the parentheses?

Answer 1

Depends on your country. British do it differently, usually outside the quotation marks, but in American "Standard English " it is inside.

Other punctuation marks have other rules with quotation marks. https://www.quickanddirtytips.com/education/grammar/how-to-use-quotation-marks

Answer 2

So would this be correct for American Standard English?

In the poem, "My Wicked Wicked Ways," Sandra Cisneros expresses....

Answer 3

Correct.