To be a smart and dexterous user of any language, you should go through every inch and out that appears in front of your eyes. For, often, it is seen that even a silly mistake can take away the enchanting and eye-catching beauty of our treatises. There are always some grammatical confusions that the users have to deal with. Unfortunately, such kinds of hidden mistakes have been made subconsciously or perhaps the users do not know anything at all about those puzzling topics that are really very pity.
Today our discussion will be focused on one of the interesting topics of English grammar; Apostrophe and its usages are quite enough to make you awestruck. So, if you are in trouble having a problem and can not make your mind up to identify the rules, exact and proper usages, then you are in the right place. This article has been arranged featuring some surprising necessity over the topic of apostrophe that you are looking for.
Apostrophe(‘)
The uses of apostrophe contain the definition of it. It has basically three usages that can be counted like-
- Plurals
- Contractions
- Possessive
As the apostrophe is rarely used to form plurals, we will mainly give insistence on the other two usages to broaden the idea and main perspective of it. Precipitously, commence on perusing the second use that is contraction.—-
Contractions
Contraction is used informally a lot. It cut off words, makes the words shorter, thus, turning those into the most striking and welcoming ones. In our daily needs, we do use those contractions to satisfy our regular purposes. Some of the most common contractions are–let’s (short version of let us), can’t (can not), it’s(it is), he’s (he is), they’re ( they are or were), etc.
Here are some warnings that you should keep in your mind while using the contractions. Make sure you are not making conflict between its and it’s. When you are supposed to express it as a subject and is as a verb, you should use the contractions it’s that refer it is. But do not mess up to be using ‘its’ that never includes the concept of the apostrophe. Rather, when you are going to make the audience realize the topic that has already been said then you should use its. In a word, its is the possessive form of the pronoun it. When you want to indicate possession or ownership just avoid apostrophe and use its.
The followings are some examples to get you out of the illusions that you are still having. Do concentrate and try to find out the difference between its and it’s.
It’s my pen.—-It is
The flag is on its pole.—its refers to the flag
It’s a nice day.—-It is
The glass is in its own rack.—-its refers to the glass
Again, Remember tense issues while using those. Its has two meanings. It can be it is or it has. So be very careful while accentuating your ideas. Like it’s ‘they’re’ contains two layers of meanings that can be are or were!
A simple but effective tip for you is— Never use contractions in your formal writing. There is a high possibility to create a bad impression about you to your teachers or other faculties where you are supposed to be very formal. Be humble and courteous in formal sector with your words.
Possessive
Possessive means possession or ownership. It is used to refer to something that belongs to someone. With apostrophe, Possessive can be made through two different rules. Let’s go through those rules rather than dragging its definition.
The normal rule forming possessive-
By adding ‘s’ with an apostrophe, you can turn a singular noun into a possessive one. There are no more hurdles in it. Now, look at the examples given below-
Don’s pen——-the pen belongs to Don
She wore her friend’s clothes.——clothes belong to her friend
Exceptional use forming possessive
The words that have already s in end do not require another extra ‘s’ to make them possessive. But using another ‘s’ preceding apostrophe is also correct. But still, there is some etiquette that you must follow to make your writing striking.
Anis’s book.
Anis’ book.
The two above examples are equally correct. But, the words that end with s and are followed by ‘sake’ take an only apostrophe. You can not add another ‘s’ here.
Incorrect: Goodness’s sake
Correct: Goodness’ sake
Incorrect: Justice’s sake
Correct: Justice’s sake
Which one is correct plural possessive? Chris’ or Chris’s?
When there is more than one noun, it is plural. The majority of nouns are made plural by adding ‘s’ though there are a few exceptionals (e.g. Tooth and Teeth, Person and People).
She had two kittens. After playing for some time, the kittens’ toy went under the refrigerator.
An exception to this rule can be applied to those nouns that do not end with ‘s’.
The women’s dressing room was small.
This is Children’s house.
So what should you use?
As we have already mentioned plural nouns only take apostrophe without using extra ‘s’. So here the correct one is ‘Chris’ and that is when you make it plural possessive. But you can use ‘s’ by adding an apostrophe to form a singular possessive like we have given examples above– (Anis’s pen and Anis’ pen. Both are correct, the latter is preferable).
So, when you indicate plural possessive, use only apostrophe with those that have already ‘s’ in their end. Leave no ambiguity and use the proper plural possessive that is ‘Chris’’ as per the topic concerns.