Activity 3a
Complete these sentences by completing the possessive form of the noun in italics:
1 The boy coat is on the chair.
2 The princess tiara is set with diamonds.
3 Charles Dickens novels are classics.
4 Most of the students books were destroyed in the fire. (students is plural)
5 The ladies rest room is being redecorated.
6 The Attorney-General office is on the top floor.
7 The women magazine will be on sale tomorrow.
Turn these ‘of’ forms into the form which places the possessing noun (in italics) first:
8 The children of my sisters-in-law are playing happily together.
9 The houses of Jack and Bill are in the same street. (separate ownership)
10 The mother of Martha and Tammy is in the garden. (joint ownership)
Solutions 3a
1 boy’s
2 princess’s
3 Dickens’s
4 students’
5 ladies’
6 Attorney-General’s
7 women’s
8 My sisters-in-law’s children
9 Jack’s and Bill’s houses
10 Martha and Tammy’s mother.
Sometimes the ‘of’ form is preferable. It just sounds odd to say the table’s top or the car’s door. In these instances, usually concerning inanimate objects, we write the top of the table and the door of the car. An alternative is to use the possessing noun as an adjective and omit the idea of possession altogether – the table top and the car door. The apostrophe is also omitted when a plural noun is used as an adjective immediately before the noun in the title of an organisation or institution, so Students’ Union becomes Students Union. The context of what you are writing will tell you which version to use.
Possession in personal pronouns (see also Section 4.2) is different – no apostrophe is used in a possessive personal pronoun. For example: His coat is on its hook. Their books are on the table. That umbrella is yours. English personal pronouns retain a case system from earlier forms of English and from Latin influence, so they change depending on how the pronoun is to be used in a sentence. The personal pronoun I, for instance, is I when it is the subject in a sentence, me when it is the object, my when it is possessive and the thing possessed is stated – mine when it is not stated. For example:
I am the owner of that umbrella. Please give it to me. That is my umbrella. I repeat – it is mine.
Do not confuse possession with contraction (see Section 7.10). If you remember that personal pronouns never contain apostrophes, you should have no difficulty when words sound the same.
Examples
| its = belonging to it (possessive)it’s = it is/it has (contraction) | whose = belonging to who (possessive)who’s = who is/who has (contraction) |
There are some other times when apostrophes are not used – for example:
plurals of numerals – Four 15s make 60.
common curtailed words – phone (telephone), plane (aeroplane)
Activity 3b
Rewrite these sentences including apostrophes where necessary to show possession. Tick any that are correct:
1 I told them what both the consultants fees would be.
2 Boys clothes are generally rather less expensive than girls.
3 The novels of writers in the last few decades discuss the social issues of our time.
4 Last week I met my fathers three brothers wives who are three sisters.
5 Box the red pamphlets up in 100s and the blue ones in 50s.
6 Yours is the larger garden, but ours has better drainage.
7 The student from Ringwood Girls School found that it is difficult to take a cello on a bus.
8 The Harrises pool is a good place to cool off on a hot day.
9 My brother-in-laws childrens bicycles are in Mrs Marshs shed.
Solutions 3b
1 I told them what both the consultants’ fees would be.
2 Boys’ clothes are generally rather less expensive than girls’.
3 Correct (the apostrophe is not used to indicate plural)
4 Last week I met my father’s three brothers’ wives who are three sisters.
5 Correct (no need for apostrophes as the figure+s combination is easy to read)
6 Correct (possessive pronouns do not include apostrophes)
7 Correct (’cello, like ’phone, is no longer used; Girls is a plural noun being used as an adjective)
8 The Harrises’ pool is a good place to cool off on a hot day.
9 My brother-in-law’s children’s bicycles are in Mrs Marsh’s shed.
Activity 3c
Rewrite these sentences including apostrophes where necessary either to show that something has been omitted (contraction) or to make something clear:
1 Mind your ps and qs and make sure you dot your is and cross your ts.
2 I invited the Greek ambassador to call at four oclock but he couldnt come.
3 Dont ask that man whos wearing the bowler hat; hell only say he doesnt know.
4 Lets go to Melbourne on Tuesday; then well have time to see the cricket, wont we?
5 Weve just been to visit Walter Smith, but because hes been ill recently and hasnt properly recovered, they wouldnt let us see him.
6 There are four ss in Mississippi but theres only one M.
Solutions 3c
1 Mind your p’s and q’s and make sure you dot your i’s and cross your t’s.
2 I invited the Greek ambassador to call at four o’clock but he couldn’t come.
3 Don’t ask that man who’s wearing the bowler hat; he’ll only say he doesn’t know.
4 Let’s go to Melbourne on Tuesday; then we’ll have time to see the cricket, won’t we?
5 We’ve just been to visit Walter Smith, but because he’s been ill recently and hasn’t properly recovered, they wouldn’t let us see him.
6 There are four s’s in Mississippi but there’s only one M.
3.10 Spell checks
Some words are problematic because they are similar in appearance to other words, but mean something entirely different. Use your dictionary to check on the meanings of words you are not sure of. In that way, the context can later help you decide on the spelling.
Be wary of computer spell checkers: they are useful up to a point, but they cannot tell the difference between, for example, there and their. As both are real English words, they will not attract the spell