a very important little squiggle adored by Teena Hughes
Today’s question: When do you use apostrophe S and S apostrophe?
Jennifer asks: I was taught, growing up, that you only use apostrophe-S when it is a contraction as in “John’s going home” as in “John is going home” and S-apostrophe for possession.
Was I taught incorrectly?????
How do you distinguish between possession and contraction in the following sentence: ” The man’s nuts.”
Does it mean “The man is nuts.” ?
Or is it reference to his testicles? How can you tell?????
Help!
Table of Contents
Today’s question comes from Mario Hernandez in the UK, and this is one of my favourite questions.
I see these two words used on images online, and because I learned English in an Australian school, we use the UK English. If you didn’t learn British English, you may not agree with this post – but that’s OK, stick with what you learned and you’ll be all set.
This video clearly explains the difference between these two words and when to use them, and below that you can read the explanation too.
Transcript
Hi guys. Dan for BBC Learning English here with this week’s Learner Question. Find out what it is after this.
Okay, this week’s Learner Question comes from Christina Gutierrez and she says, “First of all, congratulations on your splendid programs at BBC learning English.”
Thank you so much.
“They are both entertaining and useful.”
Good. That’s what we want them to be.
“I’d like to know what’s the exact difference in usage between what and which at the beginning of direct questions.”
Well, Christina, as you command, so we obey.
Now both are often possible with very little difference.
For example, “What or which is your favourite food?”, or “Which or what is the best program on TV at the moment?”
When we feel we have a limited number of choices, we prefer which, so with a menu, “Which dessert shall we have?”, or when looking at a multiple choice test, “Which one is the answer?”
On the other hand, what is used when we feel we have an unlimited number of choices.
So for example, “What should we have for dinner?”, or “What’s the answer to this question?”
Both can be used as determined as indirect question.
So when looking at a line of cars, I might say, “Which car is yours?”
But in general I could ask, “What car do you drive?”
For example, “There’s a group of people over there, which is your friend?”, or “Tim’s a lawyer. What’s James?”
I hope that answers your question Christina, thank you very much for contacting us.
Anybody else out there has a question about English they’d like answered? You can email us on learning.English@bbc.co.UK
Please remember to include:
You can also go to our website, BBCLearningEnglish.com
I’ve been Dan and I’ll see you next time on this question.
I’d love to hear your thoughts on this.
When there is a limited number of choices (“4 tools”), the preferred word is “which”.
Feel free to chat on:
Cheerio for now,
Teena!
Teena Hughes
From YouTube Description: A whole song dedicated to teaching the difference between it’s and its and when to use “apostrophe s”. The music is from a popular Adele song, I don’t own the rights
Cade asks if it’s OK to use an apostrophe with names, and I help clarify how to go about this:
She thinks the rule only applies to words like “he,” “she.”
Can you tell me whether I’m right or wrong? I believe firmly that I am, but my friend feels just as strongly that she is.
CadeRageous”
Great question Cade!
Hey there Cade — you are correct.
It’s perfectly normal to add an apostrophe s after a person’s first name when implying “is” or “has”, so it looks like you win this challenge :-)
Some examples are:
Thanks for dropping by to read “Is it OK to use an apostrophe with a person’s name?” – let me know if you have any questions or tips by :
Looking forward to hearing from you again soon!
Teena Hughes
I spotted rehabilitation with a typo as I was parking my car recently
The plate glass window of a gym had big statements about how they could help people — each letter about4 inches/10cm high, but one word jumped out at me … and here is my photo:
I see spelling errors without even looking for them — for example many stationery businesses spell stationery as “stationAry” which doesn’t actually mean “stationery” — two entirely different meanings :-)
Rehabilitation is just one of those words which is often incorrectly written or typed (as in a “typo”), and there are many similar words which can catch out many folks.
Is there a word like this which you either spell incorrectly all the time, or see written somewhere incorrectly all the time? I’d love to hear about it – drop me a link on the Contact page, or pop over to the Facebook page to share your photos and comments too :-)
Hi there!
Today I’d like to talk about what you can do before you criticise someone’s apostrophes — and save yourself some grief.
This morning I got several emails via this website, all from the same woman (using an alias) who wanted to let me know that I didn’t have a clue what I was talking about – I was intrigued to read more.
I love getting emails like this because it’s always great to get feedback — good and bad — to see where I can improve my website.
The reader’s first email was quite friendly:
I’m a bit of an apostrophe freak as well – unfortunately (!) – but the thing I find more than strange, is that your very OWN ‘Twitter description’ – is missing an apostrophe!
Here it is: “Teena Hughes loves the humble apostrophe and its friends grammar, punctuation and spelling”
It’s got to be EITHER ‘friend’s grammar’ – or ‘friends’ grammar’ … Depending, of course, on whether you’re referring to one friend, or more .. Just saying! :-) Look forward to looking at your site .. Well done for caring about ‘the humble squiggle’!
I have written back to this delightful lady and thanked her for her emails, but in this case she’s made a mistake — my use of “its” in this sentence doesn’t require an apostrophe because it is not showing ownership nor the omission of a letter. I am merely saying that the apostrophe has friends called grammar, punctuation and spelling.
If I was to rewrite the sentence using names, it would look like this:
It’s easier to see the relationship in this sentence, and to understand that no apostrophe is required. If you’re still unsure, please do let me know and I’ll add some explanations.
As I read the remaining emails, I had to raise an eyebrow — or even two, at these comments:
- You ARE kidding! THAT is totally wrong!! Totally!
- How can you be ‘teaching/preaching’ about apostrophes, when you really don’t KNOW how to use them yourself? I’m horrified!
- I’m almost speechless by your lack of knowledge about apostrophes!! You need some HELP!!!
- You are SO wrong! I’m almost speechless by your lack of knowledge about apostrophes!! You need some HELP!!! Your advice is terrible – and incorrect!
I welcome comments from visitors to my site, and healthy discussion is always worthwhile.
As I reviewed each of these statements, I tried to do so with an open mind, because it’s also possible I have made a typing error somewhere — I’m human too, and it’s happened before :-)
I realised very quickly that because this lady is from a different country, she’s assuming that my website absolutely must reflect what she has learned since childhood — in HER country.
Writing back with compassion I explained that each English-speaking country deals with apostrophes, grammar and spelling differently, and it’s not possible to lump them all together and expect them to change their rules to match only one other country.
Where that might be a dream solution or an ideal viewpoint, it’s not really practical and it also takes away the unique nature of language itself.
We are all unique human beings, with vastly varied life experiences and upbringing, sharing the planet the best ways we can, and hopefully by being the best we can be in all situations.
I wanted to write this today just to remind everyone that before you criticise / criticize anyone, please take a step back, do some research and gather a more rounded view of the situation. My email friend has been raised in a different country, and we should both embrace our differences — including apostrophe use, grammar and spelling — as there are many versions of English around the planet.
Quick update: I’ve received a couple of emails (thanks for writing!) about using a dash or colon before the 3 names of the pets. Other emails said colons were very old-fashioned and unnecessary, so there were a few varied opinions. The bottom line is, yes, we can each use whichever punctuation we like or prefer. Thanks again for the emails everyone!
Would you like to share any stories or make a comment about something like this you may have experienced? I’d love to hear from you.
Cheers
Teena
If you’d like to check out some other apostrophe pages, please visit these below:
.
I saw this text on a website today, and had to rub my eyes to make sure I was awake:
What was written:
ware and tare – both words are incorrect for the meaning of this phrase above.
If we write, “Items have a small amount of ware and tare.” using the spelling above, the sentence will mean, “Items have a small amount of goods and weight.” — whereas the author actually/probably meant, “Items have a small amount of damage and have not been worn down much.”
What should have been written? These words sound the SAME but have different spelling than the first example:
wear and tear – this spelling is correct!
In this instance, “Wear” refers to how much an item has been used or worn.
In this instance, “Tear” refers to how much an item has been used and may have damage due to its use.
TIP — there are two meanings for the word “tear” and two different ways to pronounce the same word:
Does this help? Please do let me know.
Have you seen anything similar to this? I’d love to hear from you if you have :-)
Ian asks, “Dear Aprostrophe Queen, It’s very important to me that I use apostrophes correctly, but this one has got me twisted and I hope that you can help.
I have been asked a question by email, and my immediate response was that I haven’t a clue, so I was about to shrug with the above response. Seeing it written down for possibly the first time ever sent my mind tumbling.
If I said, ‘Whose to say?’, that would be asking ‘Who has the responsibility to answer?’
If I said, ‘Who’s to say?’ that would be asking ‘Who is going to answer?’.
Which is the normally accepted question behind the phrase, or are they both worthy as a non-committal response? Thank you for any help you can give.
Kind regards, Ian”
Question: Whose to say / who’s to say?
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