Apostrophe (punctuation) on:
[Wikipedia]
[Google]
[Amazon]
' '' – referred to as "an accepted liturgical archaism" in ''
' singular effect was 'exotic primitive' ..." (with nearby sibilants ''-ce-'' in ''noces'' and ''s-'' in ''singular''). Compare treatment of other titles, above.
Guides typically seek a principle that will yield uniformity, even for foreign words that fit awkwardly with standard English punctuation.
Geonames.usgs.gov. Retrieved on 7 April 2013. Some municipalities, originally incorporated using the apostrophe, have dropped it in accordance with this policy; Taylors Falls in Minnesota, for example, was originally incorporated as "Taylor's Falls". On the state level, the federal policy is not always followed:
Where a business name is based on a family name it should in theory take an apostrophe, but many leave it out (contrast ''
Times Online (21 August 2006). Further confusion can be caused by businesses whose names look as if they should be pronounced differently without an apostrophe, such as Paulos Circus, and other companies that leave the apostrophe out of their logos but include it in written text, such as
Following an evolution in usage in the 20th century, today "the apostrophe of plurality continues in at least five areas": abbreviations, letters of the alphabet/small words, numbers, family names, and in
Larry Trask, University of Sussex: "American usage, however, does put an apostrophe here: (A) This research was carried out in 1970's." and slightly prefers ''1's and 7's'' over ''1s and 7s'' but condones both. The apostrophe is very often used in plurals of symbols, for example "that page has too many &'s and #'s on it". Some style guides state that the apostrophe is unnecessary since there is no ambiguity but that some editors and teachers prefer this usage. The addition of an ''s'' without an apostrophe may make the text difficult to read. For many numbers and symbols, a useful alternative is to write out the numbers as words (e.g. ''thousands'' instead of ''1000's'' or ''1000s'', and ''ampersands'' instead of ''&s'' or ''&'s'').
Failure to observe standard use of the apostrophe is widespread and frequently criticised as incorrect, often generating heated debate. The British founder of the
''The Daily Telegraph'', 11 November 2008
"Obsessed with Possessives"
The Carolina Chapter of the Society for Technical Communication article on apostrophe use with possessives.
The apostrophe character
Problems representing apostrophes on computers
The Apostrophe Protection Society
The Dreaded Apostrophe: An approach using a single rule only
How to use an apostrophe
The Oatmeal
"How the Past Affects the Future: The Story of the Apostrophe"
by Christina Cavella and Robin A. Kernodle
A humorous guide to proper and improper usage of the apostropheHumble apostrophe reprieved in council U-turn , The Times
18 March 2013
The Ultimate Flowchart to Using Apostrophes (Infographic)
{{Navbox diacritical marks Latin-script diacritics English orthography Hebrew diacritics Punctuation
The apostrophe ( or ) is a
and ''punctuation
Punctuation (or sometimes interpunction) is the use of spacing, conventional signs (called punctuation marks), and certain typographical devices as aids to the understanding and correct reading of written text, whether read silently or aloud. An ...
mark, and sometimes a diacritic
A diacritic (also diacritical mark, diacritical point, diacritical sign, or accent) is a glyph added to a letter or to a basic glyph. The term derives from the Ancient Greek (, "distinguishing"), from (, "to distinguish"). The word ''diacriti ...
al mark, in languages that use the Latin alphabet
The Latin alphabet or Roman alphabet is the collection of letters originally used by the ancient Romans to write the Latin language. Largely unaltered with the exception of extensions (such as diacritics), it used to write English and the o ...
and some other alphabets. In English, the apostrophe is used for two basic purposes:
* The marking of the omission of one or more letters, e.g. the contraction
Contraction may refer to:
Linguistics
* Contraction (grammar), a shortened word
* Poetic contraction, omission of letters for poetic reasons
* Elision, omission of sounds
** Syncope (phonology), omission of sounds in a word
* Synalepha, merged ...
of "do not" to "don't".
* The marking of possessive case
A possessive or ktetic form (abbreviated or ; from la, possessivus; grc, κτητικός, translit=ktētikós) is a word or grammatical construction used to indicate a relationship of possession in a broad sense. This can include strict owne ...
of nouns (as in "the eagle's feathers", "in one month's time", "at your parents' ome
Ome may refer to:
Places
* Ome (Bora Bora), a public island in the lagoon of Bora Bora
* Ome, Lombardy, Italy, a town and ''comune'' in the Province of Brescia
* Ōme, Tokyo, a city in the Prefecture of Tokyo
* Ome (crater), a crater on Mars
Tran ...
).
The word "apostrophe" comes ultimately from Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
(, 'he accent of
He or HE may refer to:
Language
* He (pronoun), an English pronoun
* He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ
* He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets
* He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...
turning away or elision'), through Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
and French.
For use in computer systems, Unicode
Unicode, formally The Unicode Standard,The formal version reference is is an information technology Technical standard, standard for the consistent character encoding, encoding, representation, and handling of Character (computing), text expre ...
has code point
In character encoding terminology, a code point, codepoint or code position is a numerical value that maps to a specific character. Code points usually represent a single grapheme—usually a letter, digit, punctuation mark, or whitespace—but ...
s for three different forms of apostrophe.
Usage in English
Historical development
The apostrophe was first used byPietro Bembo
Pietro Bembo, ( la, Petrus Bembus; 20 May 1470 – 18 January 1547) was an Italian scholar, poet, and literary theorist who also was a member of the Knights Hospitaller, and a cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church. As an intellectual of the It ...
in his edition of '' De Aetna'' (1496). It was introduced into English in the 16th century in imitation of French practice.
French practice
Introduced byGeoffroy Tory
Geoffroy Tory (also Geofroy, Latin "Godofredus Torinus") was born in Bourges around 1480 and died in Paris before 14 October 1533. He was a French humanist and an engraver, best known for adding accents on letters in French. His life's work ha ...
(1529), the apostrophe was used in place of a vowel letter to indicate elision
In linguistics, an elision or deletion is the omission of one or more sounds (such as a vowel, a consonant, or a whole syllable) in a word or phrase. However, these terms are also used to refer more narrowly to cases where two words are run toget ...
(as in in place of ). It was also frequently used in place of a final "e" (which was still pronounced at the time) when it was elided before a vowel, as in . Modern French orthography
An orthography is a set of conventions for writing a language, including norms of spelling, hyphenation, capitalization, word breaks, emphasis, and punctuation.
Most transnational languages in the modern period have a writing system, and mos ...
has restored the spelling .
Early English practice
From the 16th century, following French practice, the apostrophe was used when a vowel letter was omitted either because of incidentalelision
In linguistics, an elision or deletion is the omission of one or more sounds (such as a vowel, a consonant, or a whole syllable) in a word or phrase. However, these terms are also used to refer more narrowly to cases where two words are run toget ...
("I'm" for "I am") or because the letter no longer represented a sound ("lov'd" for "loved"). English spelling
English orthography is the writing system used to represent spoken English, allowing readers to connect the graphemes to sound and to meaning. It includes English's norms of spelling, hyphenation, capitalisation, word breaks, emphasis, and p ...
retained many inflection
In linguistic morphology, inflection (or inflexion) is a process of word formation in which a word is modified to express different grammatical categories such as tense, case, voice, aspect, person, number, gender, mood, animacy, and defin ...
s that were not pronounced as syllable
A syllable is a unit of organization for a sequence of speech sounds typically made up of a syllable nucleus (most often a vowel) with optional initial and final margins (typically, consonants). Syllables are often considered the phonological "bu ...
s, notably verb endings ("-est", "-eth", "-es", "-ed") and the noun ending "-es", which marked either plurals or possessives, also known as genitives (see Possessive apostrophe
The apostrophe ( or ) is a punctuation mark, and sometimes a diacritical mark, in languages that use the Latin alphabet and some other alphabets. In English, the apostrophe is used for two basic purposes:
* The marking of the omission of one o ...
, below). An apostrophe followed by "s" was often used to mark a plural; specifically, the ''Oxford Companion
''Oxford Companions'' is a book series published by Oxford University Press, providing general knowledge within a specific area. The first book published in the series was ''The Oxford Companion to English Literature
''The Oxford Companion to ...
to the English Language'' notes that
:There was formerly a respectable tradition (17th to 19th centuries) of using the apostrophe for noun plurals, especially in loanword
A loanword (also loan word or loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language. This is in contrast to cognates, which are words in two or more languages that are similar because th ...
s ending in a vowel (as in ... ''Comma's are used'', Philip Luckcombe, 1771) and in the consonants ''s'', ''z'', ''ch'', ''sh'', (as in ''waltz's'' and ''cotillions'', Washington Irving
Washington Irving (April 3, 1783 – November 28, 1859) was an American short-story writer, essayist, biographer, historian, and diplomat of the early 19th century. He is best known for his short stories "Rip Van Winkle" (1819) and " The Legen ...
, 1804)...
Standardisation
The use ofelision
In linguistics, an elision or deletion is the omission of one or more sounds (such as a vowel, a consonant, or a whole syllable) in a word or phrase. However, these terms are also used to refer more narrowly to cases where two words are run toget ...
has continued to the present day, but significant changes have been made to the possessive
A possessive or ktetic form (abbreviated or ; from la, possessivus; grc, κτητικός, translit=ktētikós) is a word or grammatical construction used to indicate a relationship of possession in a broad sense. This can include strict owne ...
and plural
The plural (sometimes abbreviated pl., pl, or ), in many languages, is one of the values of the grammatical category of number. The plural of a noun typically denotes a quantity greater than the default quantity represented by that noun. This de ...
uses. By the 18th century, an apostrophe with the addition of an "s" was regularly used for all possessive
A possessive or ktetic form (abbreviated or ; from la, possessivus; grc, κτητικός, translit=ktētikós) is a word or grammatical construction used to indicate a relationship of possession in a broad sense. This can include strict owne ...
singular
Singular may refer to:
* Singular, the grammatical number that denotes a unit quantity, as opposed to the plural and other forms
* Singular homology
* SINGULAR, an open source Computer Algebra System (CAS)
* Singular or sounder, a group of boar, ...
forms, even when the letter "e" was not omitted (as in "the gate's height"). This was regarded as representing not the elision of the "e" in the "-e" or "-es" ending of the word being pluralized, but the elision of the "e" from the Old English
Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain, Anglo ...
genitive
In grammar, the genitive case (abbreviated ) is the grammatical case that marks a word, usually a noun, as modifying another word, also usually a noun—thus indicating an attributive relationship of one noun to the other noun. A genitive can al ...
singular inflection
In linguistic morphology, inflection (or inflexion) is a process of word formation in which a word is modified to express different grammatical categories such as tense, case, voice, aspect, person, number, gender, mood, animacy, and defin ...
"-es".
The plural genitive did not use the "-es" inflection, and since many plural forms already consisted of the "-s" or "-es" ending, using the apostrophe in place of the elisioned "e" could lead to singular and plural possessives of a given word having the exact same spelling. The solution was to use an apostrophe after the plural
The plural (sometimes abbreviated pl., pl, or ), in many languages, is one of the values of the grammatical category of number. The plural of a noun typically denotes a quantity greater than the default quantity represented by that noun. This de ...
"s" (as in "girls' dresses"). However, this was not universally accepted until the mid-19th century. Plurals not ending in -s keep the -'s marker, such as "children's toys, the men's toilet", since there was no risk of ambiguity.
Possessive apostrophe
The apostrophe is used in English to indicate what is, for historical reasons, misleadingly called thepossessive
A possessive or ktetic form (abbreviated or ; from la, possessivus; grc, κτητικός, translit=ktētikós) is a word or grammatical construction used to indicate a relationship of possession in a broad sense. This can include strict owne ...
case in the English language. This case was called the genitive
In grammar, the genitive case (abbreviated ) is the grammatical case that marks a word, usually a noun, as modifying another word, also usually a noun—thus indicating an attributive relationship of one noun to the other noun. A genitive can al ...
until the 18th century and, like the genitive case in other languages, expresses relationships other than possession
Possession may refer to:
Law
* Dependent territory, an area of land over which another country exercises sovereignty, but which does not have the full right of participation in that country's governance
* Drug possession, a crime
* Ownership
* ...
. For example, in the expressions "the school's headmaster", "the men's department", and "tomorrow's weather", the school does not own/possess the headmaster, men do not own/possess the department, and tomorrow does not/will not own the weather. In the words of Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of English Usage
''Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of English Usage'' is a usage dictionary published by Merriam-Webster, Inc., of Springfield, Massachusetts . It is currently available in a reprint edition (1994) or . (The 1989 edition did not include ''Merriam-'' ...
:
This dictionary also cites a study that found that only 40% of the possessive forms were used to indicate actual possession.
The modern spelling convention distinguishes possessive singular forms ("Bernadette's", "flower's", "glass's", "one's") from simple plural forms ("Bernadettes", "flowers", "glasses", "ones"), and both of those from possessive plural forms ("Bernadettes'", "flowers'", "glasses'", "ones'"). For example, the word "glass's" is the singular possessive form of the noun "glass". The plural form of "glass" is "glasses" and the plural possessive form is, therefore, "glasses'". You would therefore say "I drank the glass's contents" to indicate drinking a drink, but "I drank the glasses' contents" when you've finished your second drink.
For singular forms, the modern possessive or genitive
In grammar, the genitive case (abbreviated ) is the grammatical case that marks a word, usually a noun, as modifying another word, also usually a noun—thus indicating an attributive relationship of one noun to the other noun. A genitive can al ...
inflection is a survival from certain genitive inflections in Old English, for which the apostrophe originally marked the loss of the old "e" (for example, became ). Until the 18th century, the apostrophe was extensively used to indicate plural forms. Its use for indicating plural "possessive" forms was not standard before the middle of the 19th century.
General principles for the possessive apostrophe
= Summary of rules for most situations
= * Possessive personal pronouns, serving as either noun-equivalents or adjective-equivalents, do not use an apostrophe, even when they end in "s". The complete list of those ending in the letter "s" or the corresponding sound or but not taking an apostrophe is "ours", "yours", "his", "hers", "its", "theirs", and "whose". * Other pronouns, singular nouns not ending in "s", and plural nouns not ending in "s" all take s" in the possessive: e.g., "someone's", "a cat's toys", "women's". * Plural nouns already ending in "s" take only an apostrophe after the pre-existing "s" to form the possessive: e.g., "three cats' toys".= Basic rule (singular nouns)
= For most singular nouns the ending s" is added; e.g., "the cat's whiskers". *If a singular noun ends with an "s"-sound (spelled with "-s", "-se", for example), practice varies as to whether to add s" or the apostrophe alone. In many cases, both spoken and written forms differ between writers (see detailsbelow
Below may refer to:
*Earth
*Ground (disambiguation)
*Soil
*Floor
*Bottom (disambiguation)
Bottom may refer to:
Anatomy and sex
* Bottom (BDSM), the partner in a BDSM who takes the passive, receiving, or obedient role, to that of the top or ...
).
* Acronyms and initialisms used as nouns (CD, DVD, NATO, RADAR, etc.) follow the same rules as singular nouns: e.g., "the TV's picture quality".
= Basic rule (plural nouns)
= When the noun is a normal plural, with an added "s", no extra "s" is added in the possessive; so "the neighbours' garden" (there is more than one neighbour owning the garden) is standard rather than "the neighbours's garden". * If the plural is not one that is formed by adding "s", an "s" is added for the possessive, after the apostrophe: "children's hats", "women's hairdresser", "some people's eyes" (but compare "some peoples' recent emergence into nationhood", where "peoples" is meant as the plural of the singular "people"). These principles are universally accepted. * A few English nouns have plurals that are not spelled with a final "s" but nevertheless end in an /s/ or a /z/ sound: "mice" (plural of "mouse"; also in compounds like "dormouse
A dormouse is a rodent of the family Gliridae (this family is also variously called Myoxidae or Muscardinidae by different taxonomists). Dormice are nocturnal animals found in Africa, Asia, and Europe. They are named for their long, dormant hibe ...
", "titmouse
''Baeolophus'' is a genus of birds in the family Paridae. Its members are commonly known as titmice. All the species are native to North America. In the past, most authorities retained ''Baeolophus'' as a subgenus within the genus ''Parus
...
"), "dice
Dice (singular die or dice) are small, throwable objects with marked sides that can rest in multiple positions. They are used for generating random values, commonly as part of tabletop games, including dice games, board games, role-playing g ...
" (when used as the plural of "die"), "pence" (a plural of "penny", with compounds like "sixpence" that now tend to be taken as singulars). In the absence of specific exceptional treatment in style guides, the possessives of these plurals are formed by adding an apostrophe and an "s" in the standard way: "seven titmice's tails were found", "the dice's last fall was a seven", "his few pence's value was not enough to buy bread". These would often be rephrased, where possible: "the last fall of the dice was a seven".
= Basic rule (compound nouns)
= Compound nouns have their singular possessives formed with an apostrophe and an added ''s'', in accordance with the rules given above: ''the Attorney-General's husband''; ''theLord Warden of the Cinque Ports
The Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports is a ceremonial official in the United Kingdom. The post dates from at least the 12th century, when the title was Keeper of the Coast, but may be older. The Lord Warden was originally in charge of the Cinqu ...
's prerogative''; ''this Minister for Justice's intervention''; ''her father-in-law's new wife''.
*In such examples, the plurals are formed with an ''s'' that does not occur at the end: e.g., ''attorneys-general''. A problem therefore arises with the ''possessive'' plurals of these compounds. Sources that rule on the matter appear to favour the following forms, in which there is both an ''s'' added to form the plural, and a separate ''= Joint or separate possession
= For two nouns (or noun phrases) joined by ''and'', there are several ways of expressing possession, including: :1. marking of the last noun (e.g. "Jack and Jill's children") :2. marking of both nouns (e.g. "Jack's and Jill's children"). Some grammars make no distinction in meaning between the two forms. Some publishers' style guides, however, make a distinction, assigning the "segregatory" (or "distributive") meaning to the form "John's and Mary's" and the "combinatorial" (or "joint") meaning to the form "John and Mary's". A third alternative is a construction of the form "Jack's children and Jill's", which is always distributive, i.e. it designates the combined set of Jack's children and Jill's children. When a coordinate possessive construction has two personal pronouns, the normal possessive inflection is used, and there is no apostrophe (e.g., "his and her children"). The issue of the use of the apostrophe arises when the coordinate construction includes a noun (phrase) and a pronoun. In this case, the inflection of only the last item may sometimes be, at least marginally, acceptable ("you and your spouse's bank account"). The inflection of both is normally preferred (e.g. Jack's and your dogs), but there is a tendency to avoid this construction, too, in favour of a construction that does not use a coordinate possessive (e.g. by using "Jack's letters and yours"). Where a construction like "Jack's and your dogs" is used, the interpretation is usually "segregatory" (i.e. not joint possession).= With other punctuation; compounds with pronouns
= If the word or compound includes, or even ends with, a punctuation mark, an apostrophe and an ''s'' are still added in the usual way: "Westward Ho!
Westward Ho! is a seaside village near Bideford in Devon, England. The A39 road provides access from the towns of Barnstaple, Bideford, and Bude. It lies at the south end of Northam Burrows and faces westward into Bideford Bay, opposite Saunto ...
's railway station"; "''Awaye!''McDonald's
McDonald's Corporation is an American Multinational corporation, multinational fast food chain store, chain, founded in 1940 as a restaurant operated by Richard and Maurice McDonald, in San Bernardino, California, United States. They rechri ...
'' and ''Standard & Poor's
S&P Global Ratings (previously Standard & Poor's and informally known as S&P) is an American credit rating agency (CRA) and a division of S&P Global that publishes financial research and analysis on stocks, bonds, and commodities. S&P is con ...
'' already include possessive apostrophes. For similar cases involving geographical names, see below
Below may refer to:
*Earth
*Ground (disambiguation)
*Soil
*Floor
*Bottom (disambiguation)
Bottom may refer to:
Anatomy and sex
* Bottom (BDSM), the partner in a BDSM who takes the passive, receiving, or obedient role, to that of the top or ...
.
* Similarly, the possessives of all phrases whose wording is fixed are formed in the same way:
**"Us and Them
Us and Them may refer to:
*The sociological concept of in-group and out-group
*'' Us & Them'', an American television series
* ''Us and Them'' (Australian TV series), a 1994 Australian comedy television series
* "Us and Them" (song), by Pink Floy ...
s inclusion on the album ''The Dark Side of the Moon
''The Dark Side of the Moon'' is the eighth studio album by the English rock band Pink Floyd, released on 1 March 1973 by Harvest Records. The album was primarily developed during live performances, and the band premiered an early version of ...
''
**You Am I
You Am I are an Australian alternative rock band, fronted by its lead singer-songwriter and guitarist, Tim Rogers. They formed in December 1989 and are the first Australian band to have released three successive albums that have each debuted ...
's latest CD
**The 69'ers
The 69'ers were an Australian rock, pop, jug and country band formed in 1969. They released two albums, ''The 69er's Album'' (1971) and ''Francis Butlers 69er's Live'' (1974). The group toured Australia and appeared at the Sunbury Pop Festival i ...
' drummer, Tom Callaghan (only the second apostrophe is possessive)
** '' His 'n' Hers''She
She most commonly refers to:
*She (pronoun), the third person singular, feminine, nominative case pronoun in modern English.
She or S.H.E. may also refer to:
Literature and films
*'' She: A History of Adventure'', an 1887 novel by H. Rider Hagga ...
'' success greater, or ''King Solomon's Mines
''King Solomon's Mines'' (1885) is a popular novel by the English Victorian adventure writer and fabulist Sir H. Rider Haggard. It tells of a search of an unexplored region of Africa by a group of adventurers led by Allan Quatermain for the ...
''?
:For complications with foreign phrases and titles, see below
Below may refer to:
*Earth
*Ground (disambiguation)
*Soil
*Floor
*Bottom (disambiguation)
Bottom may refer to:
Anatomy and sex
* Bottom (BDSM), the partner in a BDSM who takes the passive, receiving, or obedient role, to that of the top or ...
.
= Time, money, and similar
= An apostrophe is used in time and money references in constructions such as ''one hour's respite'', ''two weeks' holiday'', ''a dollar's worth'', ''five pounds' worth'', ''one mile's drive from here''. This is like an ordinary possessive use. For example, ''one hour's respite'' means ''a respite of one hour'' (exactly as ''the cat's whiskers'' means ''the whiskers of the cat'').= Possessive pronouns and adjectives
= No apostrophe is used in the following possessive pronouns and adjectives: ''yours'', ''his'', ''hers'', ''ours'', ''its'', ''theirs'', and ''whose''. All other possessive pronouns do end with an apostrophe and an ''s''. In singular forms, the apostrophe comes first, e.g. ''one's''; ''everyone's''; ''somebody's'', ''nobody else's'', etc., while the apostrophe follows the ''s'' in plural forms as with nouns: ''the others' complaints''. The possessive of ''it'' was originally ''it's'', and it's a common mistake today to write ''its'' this way, though the apostrophe was dropped by the early 1800s and authorities are now unanimous that ''it's'' can be only a contraction of ''it is'' or ''it has''.= Importance for disambiguation
= Each of these four phrases (listed inSteven Pinker
Steven Arthur Pinker (born September 18, 1954) is a Canadian-American cognitive psychologist, psycholinguist, popular science author, and public intellectual. He is an advocate of evolutionary psychology and the computational theory of mind.
P ...
's ''The Language Instinct
''The Language Instinct: How the Mind Creates Language'' is a 1994 book by Steven Pinker, written for a general audience. Pinker argues that humans are born with an innate capacity for language. He deals sympathetically with Noam Chomsky's claim t ...
'') has a distinct meaning:
*My sister's friend's investment ''(the investment belonging to a friend of my sister)''
*My sister's friends' investment ''(the investment belonging to several friends of my sister)''
*My sisters' friend's investment ''(the investment belonging to a friend of several of my sisters)''
*My sisters' friends' investment ''(the investment belonging to several friends of several of my sisters)''
Kingsley Amis
Sir Kingsley William Amis (16 April 1922 – 22 October 1995) was an English novelist, poet, critic, and teacher. He wrote more than 20 novels, six volumes of poetry, a memoir, short stories, radio and television scripts, and works of social an ...
, on being challenged to produce a sentence whose meaning depended on a possessive apostrophe, came up with:
*Those things over there are my husband's. (''Those things over there belong to my husband''.)
*Those things over there are my husbands'. (''Those things over there belong to several husbands of mine''.)
*Those things over there are my husbands. (''I'm married to those men over there.'')
Singular nouns ending with an "s" or "z" sound
Some singular nouns are pronounced with asibilant
Sibilants are fricative consonants of higher amplitude and pitch, made by directing a stream of air with the tongue towards the teeth. Examples of sibilants are the consonants at the beginning of the English words ''sip'', ''zip'', ''ship'', and ...
sound at the end: /s/ or /z/. The spelling of these ends with ''-s'', ''-se'', ''-z'', ''-ze'', ''-ce'', ''-x'', or ''-xe''.
Many respected authorities recommend that practically all singular nouns, including those ending with a sibilant sound, have possessive forms with an extra ''s'' after the apostrophe so that the spelling reflects the underlying pronunciation. Examples include Oxford University Press
Oxford University Press (OUP) is the university press of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world, and its printing history dates back to the 1480s. Having been officially granted the legal right to print books ...
, the Modern Language Association
The Modern Language Association of America, often referred to as the Modern Language Association (MLA), is widely considered the principal professional association in the United States for scholars of language and literature. The MLA aims to "st ...
, the BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...The Economist
''The Economist'' is a British weekly newspaper printed in demitab format and published digitally. It focuses on current affairs, international business, politics, technology, and culture. Based in London, the newspaper is owned by The Econo ...
''. Such authorities demand possessive singulars like these: ''Bridget Jones's Diary
''Bridget Jones's Diary'' is a 2001 romantic comedy film directed by Sharon Maguire and written by Richard Curtis, Andrew Davies (writer), Andrew Davies, and Helen Fielding. A co-production of the United Kingdom, United States and France, it is ...
''; ''Tony Adams's friend; my boss's job; the US's economy''. Rules that modify or extend the standard principle have included the following:
*If the singular possessive is difficult or awkward to pronounce with an added sibilant, do not add an extra ''s''; these exceptions are supported by ''The Guardian
''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...
'', ''Yahoo!
Yahoo! (, styled yahoo''!'' in its logo) is an American web services provider. It is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California and operated by the namesake company Yahoo Inc., which is 90% owned by investment funds managed by Apollo Global Man ...
Style Guide'', and '' The American Heritage Book of English Usage''. Such sources permit possessive singulars like these: ''Socrates' later suggestion''; or ''Achilles' heel'' if that is how the pronunciation is intended. The Economist
''The Economist'' is a British weekly newspaper printed in demitab format and published digitally. It focuses on current affairs, international business, politics, technology, and culture. Based in London, the newspaper is owned by The Econo ...
style guide omits the apostrophe entirely in this case.
*Some style guides advise that Classical, biblical, and similar names ending in a sibilant, especially if they are polysyllabic
A syllable is a unit of organization for a sequence of speech sounds typically made up of a syllable nucleus (most often a vowel) with optional initial and final margins (typically, consonants). Syllables are often considered the phonological "b ...
, should not take an added ''s'' in the possessive; among sources giving exceptions of this kind are ''The Times
''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (fou ...
'' and ''The Elements of Style'', which make general stipulations, and Vanderbilt University
Vanderbilt University (informally Vandy or VU) is a private research university in Nashville, Tennessee. Founded in 1873, it was named in honor of shipping and rail magnate Cornelius Vanderbilt, who provided the school its initial $1-million ...
, which mentions only ''Moses
Moses hbo, מֹשֶׁה, Mōše; also known as Moshe or Moshe Rabbeinu (Mishnaic Hebrew: מֹשֶׁה רַבֵּינוּ, ); syr, ܡܘܫܐ, Mūše; ar, موسى, Mūsā; grc, Mωϋσῆς, Mōÿsēs () is considered the most important pro ...
'' and ''Jesus''. As a particular case, ''JesusHart's Rules
''Hart's Rules for Compositors and Readers at the University Press, Oxford''—today published under the short title ''New Hart's Rules''—is an authoritative reference book and style guide published in England by Oxford University Press (OUP ...
'' – is commonly written instead of ''Jesus's''.
* There are also some entrenched uses, for example ''St James's Park
St James's Park is a park in the City of Westminster, central London. It is at the southernmost tip of the St James's area, which was named after a leper hospital dedicated to St James the Less. It is the most easterly of a near-continuous c ...
'' (in London) (but the Newcastle stadium displays its name spelled ''St James' Park
St James' Park is a football stadium in Newcastle upon Tyne, England. It is the home of Premier League club Newcastle United F.C. With a seating capacity of 52,305 seats, it is the eighth largest football stadium in England.
St James' Park ...
''), ''St James's Palace
St James's Palace is the most senior royal palace in London, the capital of the United Kingdom. The palace gives its name to the Court of St James's, which is the monarch's royal court, and is located in the City of Westminster in London. Altho ...
'' (and ''the Court of St James's
The Court of St James's is the royal court for the Sovereign of the United Kingdom. All ambassadors to the United Kingdom are formally received by the court. All ambassadors from the United Kingdom are formally accredited from the court – & ...
''), '' St. James's Hospital'' (in Dublin), ''King James's School'', Knaresborough and ''King James's School'', Almondbury (but there is no genitive at all in ''St James Park'' (Exeter) or ''St. James Park'' (Bronx); nor is there one in ''the King James Bible
The King James Version (KJV), also the King James Bible (KJB) and the Authorized Version, is an Bible translations into English, English translation of the Christian Bible for the Church of England, which was commissioned in 1604 and publis ...
'' since, like the ''Hebrew Bible
The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
''Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary''. Hebrew: ''Tān ...
,'' it is a description not a possessive).
Although less common, some contemporary writers still follow the older practice of omitting the second ''s'' in all cases ending with a sibilant, but usually not when written ''-x'' or ''-xe''. Some contemporary authorities such as the Associated Press Stylebook recommend or allow the practice of omitting the additional "s" in all words ending with an "s", but not in words ending with other sibilants ("z" and "x"). The 15th edition of ''''Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary''. Hebrew: ''Tān ...
The Chicago Manual of Style
''The Chicago Manual of Style'' (abbreviated in writing as ''CMOS'' or ''CMS'', or sometimes as ''Chicago'') is a style guide for American English published since 1906 by the University of Chicago Press. Its 17 editions have prescribed writi ...
'' had recommended the traditional practice, which included providing for several exceptions to accommodate spoken usage such as the omission of the extra ''s'' after a polysyllabic word ending in a sibilant, but the 16th edition no longer recommends omitting the possessive "s".
Similar examples of notable names ending in an ''s'' that are often given a possessive apostrophe with no additional ''s'' include ''Dickens'' and ''Williams''. There is often a policy of leaving off the additional ''s'' on any such name, but this can prove problematic when specific names are contradictory (for example, ''St James' Park
St James' Park is a football stadium in Newcastle upon Tyne, England. It is the home of Premier League club Newcastle United F.C. With a seating capacity of 52,305 seats, it is the eighth largest football stadium in England.
St James' Park ...
'' in Newcastle Newcastle usually refers to:
*Newcastle upon Tyne, a city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England
*Newcastle-under-Lyme, a town in Staffordshire, England
*Newcastle, New South Wales, a metropolitan area in Australia, named after Newcastle ...
he football groundand the area of ''St. James's Park
St James's Park is a park in the City of Westminster, central London. It is at the southernmost tip of the St James's area, which was named after a leper hospital dedicated to St James the Less. It is the most easterly of a near-continuous ch ...
'' in London). However, debate has been going on regarding the punctuation of St James' Park (Newcastle) for some time, unlike St James's Park (London) which is the less contentious version. For more details on practice with geographic names, see the relevant section below
Below may refer to:
*Earth
*Ground (disambiguation)
*Soil
*Floor
*Bottom (disambiguation)
Bottom may refer to:
Anatomy and sex
* Bottom (BDSM), the partner in a BDSM who takes the passive, receiving, or obedient role, to that of the top or ...
.
Some writers like to reflect standard spoken practice in cases like these with ''sake'': ''for convenience' sake'', ''for goodness' sake'', ''for appearance' sake'', ''for compromise' sake'', etc. This punctuation is preferred in major style guides. Others prefer to add ''Nouns ending with silent ''s'', ''x'', or ''z''
The English possessive of French nouns ending in a silent ''s'', ''x'', or ''z'' is addressed by various style guides. Certainly a sibilant is pronounced in examples like ''Descartes's'' and ''Dumas's''; the question addressed here is whether ''s'' needs to be added. Similar examples with ''x'' or ''z'': s main ingredient is truffle''; ''His 's loss went unnoticed''; ''"Verreaux('s) eagle, a large, predominantly black eagle, ''Aquila verreauxi'',..."'' (OED
The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' (''OED'') is the first and foundational historical dictionary of the English language, published by Oxford University Press (OUP). It traces the historical development of the English language, providing a co ...
, entry for "Verreaux", with silent ''x''; see Verreaux's eagle
Verreaux's eagle (''Aquila verreauxii'') is a large, mostly African, bird of prey. It is also called the black eagle, especially in southern Africa, not to be confused with the Indian black eagle (''Ictinaetus malayensis''), which lives far to t ...
); in each of these some writers might omit the added ''s''. The same principles and residual uncertainties apply with "naturalised" English words, like ''Illinois'' and ''Arkansas''.
For possessive ''plurals'' of words ending in a silent ''x'', ''z'' or ''s'', the few authorities that address the issue at all typically call for an added ''s'' and suggest that the apostrophe precede the ''s'': ''The Loucheux's homeland is in the Yukon''; ''Compare the two Dumas's literary achievements''. The possessive of a cited French title with a silent plural ending is uncertain: "Possessives in geographic names
Place names in the United States do not use the possessive apostrophe on federal maps and signs. TheUnited States Board on Geographic Names
The United States Board on Geographic Names (BGN) is a federal body operating under the United States Secretary of the Interior. The purpose of the board is to establish and maintain uniform usage of geographic names throughout the federal governm ...
, which has responsibility for formal naming of municipalities and geographic features, has deprecated the use of possessive apostrophes since 1890 so as not to show ownership of the place. Only five names of natural features in the US are officially spelled with a genitive apostrophe: Martha's Vineyard
Martha's Vineyard, often simply called the Vineyard, is an island in the Northeastern United States, located south of Cape Cod in Dukes County, Massachusetts, known for being a popular, affluent summer colony. Martha's Vineyard includes the s ...
; Ike's Point, New Jersey; John E's Pond, Rhode Island; Carlos Elmer's Joshua View, Arizona; and Clark's Mountain, Oregon.US Board on Geographic Names: FAQsGeonames.usgs.gov. Retrieved on 7 April 2013. Some municipalities, originally incorporated using the apostrophe, have dropped it in accordance with this policy; Taylors Falls in Minnesota, for example, was originally incorporated as "Taylor's Falls". On the state level, the federal policy is not always followed:
Vermont
Vermont () is a state in the northeast New England region of the United States. Vermont is bordered by the states of Massachusetts to the south, New Hampshire to the east, and New York to the west, and the Canadian province of Quebec to ...
's official state website has a page on Camel's Hump State Forest
Camel's Hump State Forest (alternatively Camels Hump State Forest) covers a total of in two blocks in the U.S. state of Vermont. Stevens Block comprises in Buels Gore, Fayston, and Starksboro in Chittenden, Washington, and Addison counties, ...
.
Australia's Intergovernmental Committee on Surveying and Mapping
ANZLIC, or The Spatial Information Council, is the peak intergovernmental organisation providing leadership in the collection, management and use of spatial information in Australia and New Zealand.
It supports the establishment of a Spatial Da ...
also has a no-apostrophe policy, a practice it says goes back to the 1900s and which is generally followed around the country.
On the other hand, the United Kingdom has Bishop's Stortford
Bishop's Stortford is a historic market town in Hertfordshire, England, just west of the M11 motorway on the county boundary with Essex, north-east of central London, and by rail from Liverpool Street station. Stortford had an estimated po ...
, Bishop's Castle
Bishop's Castle is a market town in the south west of Shropshire, England. According to the 2011 Census it had a population of 1,893.
Bishop's Castle is east of the Wales-England border, about north-west of Ludlow and about south-west of ...
and King's Lynn
King's Lynn, known until 1537 as Bishop's Lynn and colloquially as Lynn, is a port and market town in the borough of King's Lynn and West Norfolk in the county of Norfolk, England. It is located north of London, north-east of Peterborough, no ...
(among many others) but St Albans
St Albans () is a cathedral city in Hertfordshire, England, east of Hemel Hempstead and west of Hatfield, Hertfordshire, Hatfield, north-west of London, south-west of Welwyn Garden City and south-east of Luton. St Albans was the first major ...
, St Andrews
St Andrews ( la, S. Andrea(s); sco, Saunt Aundraes; gd, Cill Rìmhinn) is a town on the east coast of Fife in Scotland, southeast of Dundee and northeast of Edinburgh. St Andrews had a recorded population of 16,800 , making it Fife's fou ...
and St Helens. London Underground's Piccadilly line has the adjacent stations of Earl's Court
Earl's Court is a district of Kensington in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in West London, bordering the rail tracks of the West London line and District line that separate it from the ancient borough of Fulham to the west, the ...
in Earl's Court
Earl's Court is a district of Kensington in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in West London, bordering the rail tracks of the West London line and District line that separate it from the ancient borough of Fulham to the west, the ...
and Barons Court
Barons Court is a London Underground station in West Kensington in the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham, Greater London. This station serves the District line and the Piccadilly line. Barons Court is between West Kensington and Hamme ...
. These names were mainly fixed in form many years before grammatical rules were fully standardised. While Newcastle United
Newcastle United Football Club is an English professional football club, based in Newcastle upon Tyne, that plays in the Premier League – the top flight of English football. The club was founded in 1892 by the merger of Newcastle East End ...
play football
Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...
at a stadium called St James' Park
St James' Park is a football stadium in Newcastle upon Tyne, England. It is the home of Premier League club Newcastle United F.C. With a seating capacity of 52,305 seats, it is the eighth largest football stadium in England.
St James' Park ...
, and Exeter City
Exeter City Football Club is a professional association football club based in Exeter, Devon, England. The team play in , the third tier of the English football league system. Known as "the Grecians", the origin of their nickname is subject to ...
at St James Park St James Park and variants may refer to:
Municipalities
* St James Park, New Zealand, a suburb of Hamilton, New Zealand
Football stadiums
* St James' Park, Newcastle upon Tyne, England
* St James Park (Exeter), Exeter, England
* St James Park, g ...
, London has a St James's Park
St James's Park is a park in the City of Westminster, central London. It is at the southernmost tip of the St James's area, which was named after a leper hospital dedicated to St James the Less. It is the most easterly of a near-continuous c ...
(this whole area of London is named after the parish of St James's Church, Piccadilly
St James's Church, Piccadilly, also known as St James's Church, Westminster, and St James-in-the-Fields, is an Anglican church on Piccadilly in the centre of London, United Kingdom. The church was designed and built by Sir Christopher Wren.
T ...
).
Modern usage has been influenced by considerations of technological convenience including the economy of typewriter ribbons and films, and similar computer character "disallowance" which tend to ignore past standards. Practice in the United Kingdom and Canada is not so uniform.
Possessives in names of organizations
Sometimes the apostrophe is omitted in the names of clubs, societies, and other organizations, even though the standard principles seem to require it: ''Country Women's Association
The Country Women's Association (CWA) is the largest regional and rural advocacy group in Australia. It comprises seven independent State and Territory Associations, who are passionate advocates for country women and their families, working ...
'', but ''International Aviation Association''; ''Magistrates' Court of Victoria
The Magistrates' Court of Victoria is the lowest court in the Australian state of Victoria.
The court possesses original jurisdiction over summary offences and indictable offences heard summarily, as well as civil claims up to $100,000. It ...
'', but ''Federated Ship Painters and Dockers Union
The Federated Ship Painters and Dockers Union (FSPDU) was an Australian trade union which existed between 1900 and 1993. It represented labourers in the shipbuilding industry, covering "mostly work associated with chipping, painting, scrubbing ...
''. Usage is variable and inconsistent. Style guides typically advise consulting an official source for the standard form of the name (as one would do if uncertain about other aspects of the spelling of the name); some tend towards greater prescriptiveness, for or against such an apostrophe. As the case of ' shows, it is not possible to analyze these forms simply as non-possessive plurals, since ''women'' is the only correct plural form of ''woman''.
Possessives in business names
Where a business name is based on a family name it should in theory take an apostrophe, but many leave it out (contrast ''Sainsbury's
J Sainsbury plc, trading as Sainsbury's, is the second largest chain of supermarkets in the United Kingdom, with a 14.6% share of UK supermarket sales.
Founded in 1869 by John James Sainsbury with a shop in Drury Lane, London, the company wa ...
'' with ''Harrods
Harrods Limited is a department store located on Brompton Road in Knightsbridge, London, England. It is currently owned by the state of Qatar via its sovereign wealth fund, the Qatar Investment Authority. The Harrods brand also applies to other ...
''). In recent times there has been an increasing tendency to drop the apostrophe. Names based on a first name are more likely to take an apostrophe, but this is not always the case. Some business names may inadvertently spell a different name if the name with an ''s'' at the end is also a name, such as Parson. A small activist group called the Apostrophe Protection Society
The Apostrophe Protection Society is a UK society with "the specific aim of preserving the correct use of this currently much abused punctuation mark". It was founded in 2001 by John Richards, a retired sub-editor, in response to his observation ...
has campaigned for large retailers such as Harrods, Currys
Currys (branded as Currys PC World between 2010 and 2021) is an electrical retailer and aftercare service provider operating in the United Kingdom and Ireland, specialising in white goods, consumer electronics, computers and mobile phones.
E ...
, and Selfridges
Selfridges, also known as Selfridges & Co., is a chain of high-end department stores in the United Kingdom that is operated by Selfridges Retail Limited, part of the Selfridges Group of department stores. It was founded by Harry Gordon Selfridge ...
to reinstate their missing punctuation. A spokesperson for Barclays PLC
Barclays () is a British multinational universal bank, headquartered in London, England. Barclays operates as two divisions, Barclays UK and Barclays International, supported by a service company, Barclays Execution Services.
Barclays traces ...
stated, "It has just disappeared over the years. Barclays is no longer associated with the family name."Harrods told to put its apostrophe backTimes Online (21 August 2006). Further confusion can be caused by businesses whose names look as if they should be pronounced differently without an apostrophe, such as Paulos Circus, and other companies that leave the apostrophe out of their logos but include it in written text, such as
Cadwalader's
Cadwaladers is a family run chain of cafes that originated in Gwynedd, Wales. The original ice cream parlour was introduced by husband and wife David and Hannah Cadwalader in 1927 in Criccieth and was originally run as a general store. The busine ...
.
Apostrophe showing omission
An apostrophe is commonly used to indicate omitted characters, normally letters: * It is used in contractions, such as ''can't'' from ''cannot'', ''it's'' from ''it is'' or ''it has'', and ''I'll'' from ''I will'' or ''I shall''. * It is used inabbreviation
An abbreviation (from Latin ''brevis'', meaning ''short'') is a shortened form of a word or phrase, by any method. It may consist of a group of letters or words taken from the full version of the word or phrase; for example, the word ''abbrevia ...
s, as ''gov't'' for ''government''. It may indicate omitted numbers where the spoken form is also capable of omissions, as ''compound word
In linguistics, a compound is a lexeme (less precisely, a word or sign) that consists of more than one stem. Compounding, composition or nominal composition is the process of word formation that creates compound lexemes. Compounding occurs when ...
. For example, it is not common to write ''P G Wodehouse
Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, ( ; 15 October 188114 February 1975) was an English author and one of the most widely read humorists of the 20th century. His creations include the feather-brained Bertie Wooster and his sagacious valet, Jeeve ...
and "Frank Richards" ( Charles Hamilton), but this has been superseded by ''shan't''.
**Shortenings with more apostrophes, such as ''y'all'dn't've'' (y'all
''Y'all'' (pronounced ) is a contraction of ''you'' and ''all'', sometimes combined as ''you-all''. ''Y'all'' is the main second-person plural pronoun in Southern American English, with which it is most frequently associated, though it also ap ...
wouldn't have), are possible, particularly in Southern US dialects.
*It is sometimes used when the normal form of an inflection seems awkward or unnatural; for example, ''KO'd'' rather than ''KOed'' (where ''KO'' is used as a verb meaning "to knock out"); "''a spare pince-nez'd man''" (cited in OED
The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' (''OED'') is the first and foundational historical dictionary of the English language, published by Oxford University Press (OUP). It traces the historical development of the English language, providing a co ...
, entry for "pince-nez"; ''pince-nezed'' is also in citations).
*An apostrophe's function as possessive or contractive can depend on the grammatical context:
**We rehearsed for Friday's opening night. (''We rehearsed for the opening night on Friday.'')
**We rehearsed because Friday's opening night. (''We rehearsed because Friday is opening night.'' "Friday's" here is a contraction of "Friday is.")
* Eye dialects use apostrophes in creating the effect of a non-standard pronunciation.
*Apostrophes to omit letters in place names are common on British road signs when space does not allow for the full name for example, Wolverhampton
Wolverhampton () is a city, metropolitan borough and administrative centre in the West Midlands, England. The population size has increased by 5.7%, from around 249,500 in 2011 to 263,700 in 2021. People from the city are called "Wulfrunian ...
abbreviated as "W'hampton" and Kidderminster
Kidderminster is a large market and historic minster town and civil parish in Worcestershire, England, south-west of Birmingham and north of Worcester. Located north of the River Stour and east of the River Severn, in the 2011 census, it had ...
as "K'minster".
*The United States Board on Geographic Names
The United States Board on Geographic Names (BGN) is a federal body operating under the United States Secretary of the Interior. The purpose of the board is to establish and maintain uniform usage of geographic names throughout the federal governm ...
, while discouraging possessive apostrophes in place names, allows apostrophes indicating omission, as in "Lake O' the Woods," or when normally present in a surname, as in "O'Malley Draw".
Use in forming some plurals
Following an evolution in usage in the 20th century, today "the apostrophe of plurality continues in at least five areas": abbreviations, letters of the alphabet/small words, numbers, family names, and in non-standard
Standardization or standardisation is the process of implementing and developing technical standards based on the consensus of different parties that include firms, users, interest groups, standards organizations and governments. Standardization ...
use.
Abbreviations
For abbreviations, including acronyms, the use of ''s'' without an apostrophe is now more common than its use with an apostrophe. Most modern style guides disparage the use of apostrophes in all plural abbreviations. Some references continue to condone their use, or even recommend their use in some abbreviations. For example, ''The Canadian Style'' states "Add an apostrophe and ''s'' to form the plural of abbreviations containing more than one period", so ''G.M.'s'' is preferred to ''G.M.s''. The ''Oxford Companion
''Oxford Companions'' is a book series published by Oxford University Press, providing general knowledge within a specific area. The first book published in the series was ''The Oxford Companion to English Literature
''The Oxford Companion to ...
to the English Language'' condones ''V.I.P.'s'', ''VIP's'', and ''VIPs'' equally.
Letters of the alphabet, and small words
For single lowercase letters, pluralization with ''The Chicago Manual of Style
''The Chicago Manual of Style'' (abbreviated in writing as ''CMOS'' or ''CMS'', or sometimes as ''Chicago'') is a style guide for American English published since 1906 by the University of Chicago Press. Its 17 editions have prescribed writi ...
'' recommends the apostrophe of plurality only for lowercase letters. Sometimes, adding just ''s'' rather than s'' may leave meaning ambiguous or presentation inelegant. However, an apostrophe is not always the preferred solution. APA style
APA style (also known as APA format) is a writing style and format for academic documents such as scholarly journal articles and books. It is commonly used for citing sources within the field of behavioral and social sciences, including sociol ...
requires the use of italics instead of an apostrophe: ''p''s, ''n''s, etc.
In the phrase ''dos and don'ts'', most modern style guides disparage spelling the first word as ''do's''. However, there is a lack of consensus and certainly the use of an apostrophe continues, legitimately, in which "the apostrophe of plurality occurs in the first word but not the second".
Numbers and symbols
The ''Oxford Companion
''Oxford Companions'' is a book series published by Oxford University Press, providing general knowledge within a specific area. The first book published in the series was ''The Oxford Companion to English Literature
''The Oxford Companion to ...
to the English Language'' notes that "a plural ''s'' after a set of numbers is often preceded by an apostrophe, as in ''3's and 4's''..., but many housestyles and individuals now favour ''3s and 4s''". Most style guides prefer the lack of apostrophe for groups of years (e.g. ''1980s'') and will prefer ''90s'' or ''Larry Trask, University of Sussex: "American usage, however, does put an apostrophe here: (A) This research was carried out in 1970's." and slightly prefers ''1's and 7's'' over ''1s and 7s'' but condones both. The apostrophe is very often used in plurals of symbols, for example "that page has too many &'s and #'s on it". Some style guides state that the apostrophe is unnecessary since there is no ambiguity but that some editors and teachers prefer this usage. The addition of an ''s'' without an apostrophe may make the text difficult to read. For many numbers and symbols, a useful alternative is to write out the numbers as words (e.g. ''thousands'' instead of ''1000's'' or ''1000s'', and ''ampersands'' instead of ''&s'' or ''&'s'').
Family names
The vast majority of English references published from the late 20th century onwards disparage the use of apostrophes in family-name plurals, for example identifying ''Joneses'' as correct and ''Jones's'' as incorrect. As an exception, the ''Oxford Companion
''Oxford Companions'' is a book series published by Oxford University Press, providing general knowledge within a specific area. The first book published in the series was ''The Oxford Companion to English Literature
''The Oxford Companion to ...
to the English Language'' (2018) reports that, in addition to ''Joneses'' etc., standard apostrophe usage does continue "in family names, especially if they end in ''-s'', as in '' keeping up with the Jones's''".
Nonstandard use
See , below.Use in non-English names
Names that are not strictly native to English sometimes have an apostrophe substituted to represent other characters (see also As a mark of elision, below). *Anglicised versions ofIrish surnames
A formal Irish name consists of a given name and a surname. In the Irish language, surnames are generally patronymic in etymology but are no longer literal patronyms as, for example, most Icelandic names still are. The form of a surname varies ac ...
typically contain an apostrophe after an ''O'' (in place of Ó), for example "Dara O'Brian" for .
*Some Scottish and Irish
Irish may refer to:
Common meanings
* Someone or something of, from, or related to:
** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe
***Éire, Irish language name for the isle
** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...
surnames use an apostrophe after an ''M'', for example ''M'Gregor''. The apostrophe here may be seen as marking a contraction where the prefix ''Mc'' or '' Mac'' would normally appear. However, it may also arise from a misinterpretation of printers' use of an inverted comma, (''turned comma'' or "6-quote"), as a substitute for superscript ''c'' when printing with hand-set metal type. Compare: M'Lean, McLean, M‘Lean.
Use in transliteration
Intransliterated
Transliteration is a type of conversion of a text from one script to another that involves swapping letters (thus '' trans-'' + '' liter-'') in predictable ways, such as Greek → , Cyrillic → , Greek → the digraph , Armenian → or ...
foreign words, an apostrophe may be used to separate letters or syllables that otherwise would likely be interpreted incorrectly. For example:
*in the Arabic
Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic languages, Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C ...
word , a transliteration of , the syllables are as in ''mus·haf'', not ''mu·shaf''
*in the Japanese name ''Shin'ichi
Shin'ichi or Shinichi (しんいち, シンイチ) is a masculine Japanese given name. ''Shin'' and ''ichi'' are separated and it is pronounced .
Possible writings
Different kanji that are pronounced are combined with the kanji for " to give dif ...
'', the apostrophe shows that the pronunciation is ''shi·n·i·chi'' (hiragana
is a Japanese syllabary, part of the Japanese writing system, along with ''katakana'' as well as ''kanji''.
It is a phonetic lettering system. The word ''hiragana'' literally means "flowing" or "simple" kana ("simple" originally as contrast ...
), where the letters ''n'' () and ''i'' () are separate morae
A mora (plural ''morae'' or ''moras''; often symbolized μ) is a basic timing unit in the phonology of some spoken languages, equal to or shorter than a syllable. For example, a short syllable such as ''ba'' consists of one mora (''monomoraic'') ...
, rather than ''shi·ni·chi'' ().
*in the Chinese Pinyin
Hanyu Pinyin (), often shortened to just pinyin, is the official romanization system for Standard Mandarin Chinese in China, and to some extent, in Singapore and Malaysia. It is often used to teach Mandarin, normally written in Chinese for ...
romanization, the apostrophe (, , géyīn fúhào, 'syllable-dividing mark') is used before a syllable starting with a vowel (''a'', ''o'', or ''e'') in a multiple-syllable word when the syllable does not start the word (which is most commonly realized as ), unless the syllable immediately follows a hyphen
The hyphen is a punctuation mark used to join words and to separate syllables of a single word. The use of hyphens is called hyphenation. ''Son-in-law'' is an example of a hyphenated word. The hyphen is sometimes confused with dashes (figure d ...
or other dash. This is done to remove ambiguity that could arise, as in ''Xi'an
Xi'an ( , ; ; Chinese: ), frequently spelled as Xian and also known by #Name, other names, is the list of capitals in China, capital of Shaanxi, Shaanxi Province. A Sub-provincial division#Sub-provincial municipalities, sub-provincial city o ...
'', which consists of the two syllables ' ("") ' (""), compared to such words as ' (""). (This ambiguity does not occur when tone marks are used: The two tone marks in ' unambiguously show that the word consists of two syllables. However, even with tone marks, the city is usually spelled with an apostrophe as '.)
Furthermore, an apostrophe may be used to indicate a glottal stop
The glottal plosive or stop is a type of consonantal sound used in many spoken languages, produced by obstructing airflow in the vocal tract or, more precisely, the glottis. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents thi ...
in transliterations. For example:
*in the Arabic word , a common transliteration of (part of) ''al-qur'ān'', the apostrophe corresponds to the diacritic Maddah over the , one of the letters in the Arabic alphabet
Rather than (modifier letter left half ring
The modifier letter left half ring ( ) is a character of the Unicode Spacing Modifier Letters range, used to transliterate the letter ayin
''Ayin'' (also ''ayn'' or ''ain''; transliterated ) is the sixteenth letter of the Semitic ...
), the apostrophe is sometimes used to indicate a voiced pharyngeal fricative
The voiced pharyngeal approximant or fricative is a type of consonantal sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is , and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is ?\. Epiglotta ...
as it sounds and looks like the glottal stop to most English speakers. For example:
*in the Arabic word for , the apostrophe corresponds to the Arabic letter .
Finally, in "scientific" transliteration of Cyrillic script, the apostrophe usually represents the soft sign
The soft sign (Ь, ь, italics ) also known as the front yer, front jer, or er malak (lit. "small er") is a letter of the Cyrillic script. In Old Church Slavonic, it represented a short (or "reduced") front vowel. As with its companion, the b ...
, though in "ordinary" transliteration it is usually omitted. For example,
* "The Ob River
}
The Ob ( rus, Обь, p=opʲ: Ob') is a major river in Russia. It is in western Siberia; and together with Irtysh forms the world's List of rivers by length, seventh-longest river system, at . It forms at the confluence of the Biya (river), Biya ...
(Russian: Обь), also Ob', is a major river in western Siberia,...".
Non-standard English use
Failure to observe standard use of the apostrophe is widespread and frequently criticised as incorrect, often generating heated debate. The British founder of the Apostrophe Protection Society
The Apostrophe Protection Society is a UK society with "the specific aim of preserving the correct use of this currently much abused punctuation mark". It was founded in 2001 by John Richards, a retired sub-editor, in response to his observation ...
earned a 2001 Ig Nobel prize for "efforts to protect, promote and defend the differences between plural and possessive". A 2004 report by British examination board OCR stated that "the inaccurate use of the apostrophe is so widespread as to be almost universal". A 2008 survey found that nearly half of the UK adults polled were unable to use the apostrophe correctly.Half of Britons struggle with the apostrophe''The Daily Telegraph'', 11 November 2008
Superfluous apostrophes ("greengrocers' apostrophes")
Apostrophes used in a non-standard manner to formnoun
A noun () is a word that generally functions as the name of a specific object or set of objects, such as living creatures, places, actions, qualities, states of existence, or ideas.Example nouns for:
* Living creatures (including people, alive, d ...
plural
The plural (sometimes abbreviated pl., pl, or ), in many languages, is one of the values of the grammatical category of number. The plural of a noun typically denotes a quantity greater than the default quantity represented by that noun. This de ...
s are known as ''greengrocers' apostrophes'' or ''grocers' apostrophes'', often written as ''greengrocer's apostrophes'' or ''grocer's apostrophes''. They are sometimes humorously called ''greengrocers apostrophe's'', ''rogue apostrophes'', or ''idiot's apostrophes'' (a literal translation of the German grammar#Plurals, German word ''Deppenapostroph'', which criticises the misapplication of apostrophes in Denglisch). The practice, once common and acceptable (see #Historical development, Historical development), comes from the identical sound of the plural
The plural (sometimes abbreviated pl., pl, or ), in many languages, is one of the values of the grammatical category of number. The plural of a noun typically denotes a quantity greater than the default quantity represented by that noun. This de ...
and possessive
A possessive or ktetic form (abbreviated or ; from la, possessivus; grc, κτητικός, translit=ktētikós) is a word or grammatical construction used to indicate a relationship of possession in a broad sense. This can include strict owne ...
forms of most English noun
A noun () is a word that generally functions as the name of a specific object or set of objects, such as living creatures, places, actions, qualities, states of existence, or ideas.Example nouns for:
* Living creatures (including people, alive, d ...
s. It is often criticised as a form of hypercorrection coming from a widespread ignorance of the proper use of the apostrophe or of punctuation in general. Lynne Truss, author of ''Eats, Shoots & Leaves'', points out that before the 19th century it was standard orthography to use the apostrophe to form a plural of a foreign-sounding word that ended in a vowel (e. g., , , , , , ) to clarify pronunciation. Truss says this usage is no longer considered proper in formal writing.
The term is believed to have been coined in the middle of the 20th century by a teacher of languages working in Liverpool, at a time when such mistakes were common in the handwritten signs and advertisements of greengrocers (e. g., '' shilling, 1/- a pound, 1/6penny, d a pound''). Some have argued that its use in mass communication by employees of well-known companies has led to the less literate assuming it to be standard and adopting the habit themselves.
The same use of apostrophe before noun
A noun () is a word that generally functions as the name of a specific object or set of objects, such as living creatures, places, actions, qualities, states of existence, or ideas.Example nouns for:
* Living creatures (including people, alive, d ...
plural
The plural (sometimes abbreviated pl., pl, or ), in many languages, is one of the values of the grammatical category of number. The plural of a noun typically denotes a quantity greater than the default quantity represented by that noun. This de ...
-s forms is sometimes made by non-native speakers of English. For example, in Dutch grammar#Plural, Dutch, the apostrophe is inserted before the ''s'' when pluralising most words ending in a vowel or ''y'' for example, (English ''babies'') and (English ''radios''). This often produces so-called "Dunglish" errors when carried over into English. Hyperforeignism has been formalised in some pseudo-anglicisms. For example, the French word (from English ''pin'') is used (with the apostrophe in both singular and plural) for collectible lapel pins. Similarly, there is an Andorran football club called (after such British clubs as Rangers F.C.) and a Japanese dance group called Super Monkey's.
Omission
In the UK there is a tendency to drop apostrophes in many commonly used names such as Lytham St Annes, St Annes, St Johns Lane, and so on. UK supermarket chain Tesco omits the mark where standard practice would require it. Signs in Tesco advertise (among other items) . In his book ''Bryson's Dictionary of Troublesome Words, Troublesome Words'', author Bill Bryson lambasts Tesco for this, stating that "the mistake is inexcusable, and those who make it are linguistic Neanderthals in popular culture, Neanderthals." TheUnited States Board on Geographic Names
The United States Board on Geographic Names (BGN) is a federal body operating under the United States Secretary of the Interior. The purpose of the board is to establish and maintain uniform usage of geographic names throughout the federal governm ...
discourages the use of possessive apostrophes in geographic names (see #Possessives in geographic names, above), though state agencies do not always conform; Vermont's official state website provides information concerning Camel's Hump State Forest
Camel's Hump State Forest (alternatively Camels Hump State Forest) covers a total of in two blocks in the U.S. state of Vermont. Stevens Block comprises in Buels Gore, Fayston, and Starksboro in Chittenden, Washington, and Addison counties, ...
.
The Geographical Names Board of New South Wales, Australia, excludes possessive apostrophes from place names, along with other punctuation.
Particular cases
George Bernard Shaw, a proponent of English-language spelling reform, English spelling reform on phonetic principles, argued that the apostrophe was mostly redundant. He did not use it for spelling ''cant'', ''hes'', etc., in many of his writings. He did, however, allow ''I'm'' and ''it's''. Hubert Selby Jr. used a slash instead of an apostrophe mark for contractions and did not use an apostrophe at all for possessives. Lewis Carroll made greater use of apostrophes, and frequently used ''sha'n't'', with an apostrophe in place of the elided ''ll'' as well as the more usual ''o''. These authors' usages have not become widespread. The British pop group Hear'Say famously made unconventional use of an apostrophe in its name. Truss comments that "the naming of Hear'Say in 2001 was [...] a significant milestone on the road to punctuation anarchy".Criticism
Over the years, the use of apostrophes has been criticised. George Bernard Shaw called them "uncouth bacilli", referring to the apostrophe-like shape of many Bacillus, bacteria. The author and language commentator Anu Garg has called for the abolition of the apostrophe, stating "Some day this world would be free of metastatic cancers, narcissistic con men, and the apostrophe." In his book ''American Speech'', linguist Steven Byington stated of the apostrophe that "the language would be none the worse for its abolition". Adrian Room, in his ''English Journal'' article "Axing the Apostrophe", argued that apostrophes are unnecessary, and context will resolve any ambiguity. In a letter to the ''English Journal'', Peter Brodie stated that apostrophes are "largely decorative ... [and] rarely clarify meaning". John C. Wells, emeritus professor of phonetics at University College London, says the apostrophe is "a waste of time". The Apostrophe Protection Society, founded by retired journalist John Richards in 2001, was brought to a full stop in 2019, Richards (then aged 96) accepting that "the ignorance and laziness present in modern times have won!".Non-English use
As a mark of elision
In many languages, especially European languages, the apostrophe is used to indicate theelision
In linguistics, an elision or deletion is the omission of one or more sounds (such as a vowel, a consonant, or a whole syllable) in a word or phrase. However, these terms are also used to refer more narrowly to cases where two words are run toget ...
of one or more sounds, as in English.
*In Albanian language, Albanian the apostrophe is used to show that a vowel has been omitted from words, especially in different forms of verbs and in some forms of personal pronoun. For example, : them (from : them), (from ). It is used too in some of the forms of possessive pronouns, for example: (from ).
*In Afrikaans, as in Dutch, the apostrophe is used to show that letters have been omitted from words. The most common use is in the indefinite article , which is a contraction of ''een'' meaning 'one' (the number). As the initial ''e'' is omitted and cannot be capitalised, the second word in a sentence that begins with is capitalised instead. For example: , 'A tree is green'. In addition, the apostrophe is used for plurals and diminutives where the root ends with long vowels, e.g. , , , , etc.
* In Catalan language, Catalan, French, Italian language, Italian, Ligurian (Romance language), Ligurian, and Occitan language, Occitan word sequences such as , (often shortened to ''maître d'', when used in English), and the final vowel in the first word (''de'' 'of', ''le'' 'the', etc.) is elided because the word that follows it starts with a vowel or a H, mute h. Similarly, French has instead of ('that he'), instead of ('it is or it's'), and so on. Catalan, French, Italian, and Occitan surnames sometimes contain apostrophes of elision, e.g. ,
*In Danish language, Danish, apostrophes are sometimes seen on advertising, commercial materials. One might commonly see ('Take me with [you]') next to a stand with advertisement leaflets; that would be written in standard orthography. As in German, the apostrophe must not be used to indicate the possessive, except when there is already an ''s'', ''x'' or ''z'' present in the base form, as in ('the Book of Esajas').
*In Dutch language, Dutch, as in Afrikaans, the apostrophe is used to indicate omitted characters. For example, the indefinite article can be shortened to , and the definite article shortened to . When this happens in the first word of a sentence, the ''second'' word of the sentence is capitalised. In general, this way of using the apostrophe is considered non-standard, except as ''Genitive case, genitivus temporalis'' in , , , (for , 'at morning, at afternoon, at evening, at night') and in some frozen place names such as '''s-Hertogenbosch'' (possessive
A possessive or ktetic form (abbreviated or ; from la, possessivus; grc, κτητικός, translit=ktētikós) is a word or grammatical construction used to indicate a relationship of possession in a broad sense. This can include strict owne ...
, lit. "The Duke's forest"), '''s-Gravenhage'' (traditional name of The Hague, lit. "The Count's hedge"), '''s-Gravenbrakel'' (Braine-le-Comte, in Belgium), '''s-Hertogenrade'' (Herzogenrath, in Germany), etc. In addition, the apostrophe is used for plurals where the singulars end with long vowels, e.g. , ; and for the genitive of proper names ending with these vowels, e.g. , . These are in fact elided vowels; use of the apostrophe prevents spellings like and . However, most diminutives do not use an apostrophe where the plural forms would; producing spellings such as and .
*In Esperanto, the limits the elision mark to the definite article (from ) and singular nominative nouns ( from , 'heart'). This is mostly confined to poetry and songs. Idiomatic phrases such as (from , 'thanks to') and (from 'of the') are nonetheless frequent. In-word elision is usually marked with a hyphen
The hyphen is a punctuation mark used to join words and to separate syllables of a single word. The use of hyphens is called hyphenation. ''Son-in-law'' is an example of a hyphenated word. The hyphen is sometimes confused with dashes (figure d ...
, as in (from , 'Dr'). Some early guides used and advocated the use of apostrophes between word parts, to aid recognition of such compound word
In linguistics, a compound is a lexeme (less precisely, a word or sign) that consists of more than one stem. Compounding, composition or nominal composition is the process of word formation that creates compound lexemes. Compounding occurs when ...
s as , 'guitarist'; but in the latter case, modern usage is to use either a hyphen or a middle dot when disambiguation is necessary, as in ''ĉas-hundo'' or ''ĉas·hundo'', "a hunting dog", not to be mispronounced as ''ĉa.ŝun.do''.
* In Finnish, the apostrophe is used in inflected forms of words whose basic form has a "k" between similar vowels, to show that the "k" has elided in the inflected form: for example the word ' ("raw") becomes ' in the plural. The apostrophe shows that the vowels on either side of it belong to different syllables.
* French feminine singular possessive adjectives do not undergo elision, but change to the masculine form instead: ' preceding ' becomes ' ('my church').
** Quebec's Bill 101, which dictates the use of Quebec French, French in the province, prohibits the use of apostrophes in proper names in which it would not be used in proper French (thus the international donut chain Tim Hortons, originally spelled with the possessive apostrophe as Tim Horton's, was required to drop the apostrophe in Quebec to comply with Bill 101).
* Galician language standard admits the use of apostrophe () for contractions that normally do not use (e.g.: de + a= da) it but when the second element is a proper noun, mostly a title: (the hero of the Odyssey). They are also used to reproduce oral ellisions and, as stated below, to join (or split) commercial names of popular public establishments, namely bars and in masculine (, The pot).
* In Luganda, Ganda, when a word ending with a vowel is followed by a word beginning with a vowel, the final vowel of the first word is elision, elided and the initial vowel of the second word vowel length, lengthened in compensation. When the first word is a monosyllable, this elision is represented in the orthography with an apostrophe: in ' 'the father of the children', ' ('of') becomes ''w''; in ' ('who is it?'), ' ('who') becomes ''y''. But the final vowel of a polysyllable is always written, even if it is elided in speech: ' ('this man'), not *', because ' ('man') is a polysyllable.
* In German an apostrophe is used almost exclusively to indicate omitted letters. It must not be used for plurals or most of the possessive forms. The only exceptions are the possessive cases of names ending in an "s"-sound as in ', or "to prevent ambiguities" in all other possessive cases of names, as in ' (referring to the female name ', not the male name '). The English/Saxon style of using an apostrophe for possession was introduced after the spelling reform, but is strongly disagreed on by native speakers, and discouraged. Although possessive usage (beyond the exceptions) is widespread, it is often deemed incorrect. The German equivalent of "greengrocers' apostrophes" would be the derogatory ' ('idiot's apostrophe'; ).
* In modern printings of Ancient Greek, apostrophes are also used to mark elision. Some Ancient Greek words that end in short vowels elide when the next word starts with a vowel. For example, many Ancient Greek authors would write (') for (') and (') for ('). Such modern usage should be carefully distinguished from polytonic orthography, polytonic Greek's native rough breathing, rough and smooth breathing marks, which usually appear as a form of rounded apostrophe.
* In Hebrew, the ''geresh'' (׳), often typed as an apostrophe, is used to denote initialisms. A double ''geresh'' (״), known by the dual form gershayim, is used to denote acronyms; it is inserted before (i.e., to the right of) the last letter of the acronym. Examples: (abbreviation for , 'professor', 'professor'); (', 'P.S.'). The ''geresh'' is also used to indicate the elision of a sound; however, this use is much less frequent, and confined to the purpose of imitating a natural, informal utterance, for example: (' – short for , ', 'I am/do not').
*In Irish, the past tense of verbs beginning with a vowel, or with ''fh'' followed by a vowel, begins with ''d' ''(elision of ''do''), for example becomes ('opened') and becomes ('returned'). The Copula (linguistics), copula is often elided to ''As a glottal stop
Several languages and transliteration systems use the apostrophe or some similar mark to indicate aglottal stop
The glottal plosive or stop is a type of consonantal sound used in many spoken languages, produced by obstructing airflow in the vocal tract or, more precisely, the glottis. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents thi ...
, sometimes considering it a letter of the alphabet:
*In several Finno-Ugric languages, such as Estonian language, Estonian and Finnish language, Finnish; for example in the Finnish word ', being the genitive or accusative of ' ('raw').
*In Guaraní language, Guarani, it is called ' , and used in the words ' (language, to speak), ' (grass), ' (sterile).
*In Hawaiian language, Hawaiian, the ''okina'' , an inverted apostrophe, is often rendered as . It is considered a letter of the alphabet.
*Mayan language, Mayan.
*In the Tongan language, the apostrophe is called a ' and is the last letter of the alphabet. It represents the glottal stop. Like the okina, it is inverted.
*Various other Austronesian languages, such as Samoan language, Samoan, Tahitian language, Tahitian, and Chamorro language, Chamorro.
*Tetum language, Tetum, one of the official languages of East Timor.
*The Brazilian native Tupi language.
*Mossi language, Mossi (Mooré), a language of Burkina Faso.
*In Võro language, Võro, the apostrophe is used in parallel with the letter ''q'' as symbol of plural.
*Several fictional languages such as Klingon language, Klingon, D'ni language, D'ni, Mando'a or Na'vi language, Na'vi add apostrophes to make names appear "alien".
The apostrophe represents sounds resembling the glottal stop in the Turkic languages and in some romanizations of Semitic languages, including Arabic language, Arabic and Hebrew language, Hebrew. In that case, the letter ''ayin, 'ayn'' (Arabic ع and Hebrew ע) is correspondingly transliterated with the opening single quotation mark.
As a mark of palatalization or non-palatalization
Some languages and transliteration systems use the apostrophe to mark the presence, or the lack of, palatalization (phonetics), palatalization: *In Belarusian language, Belarusian and Ukrainian language, Ukrainian, the apostrophe is used between a consonant and a following "soft" (Iotation, iotified) vowel (Be.: е, ё, ю, я; Uk.: є, ї, ю, я) to indicate that ''no'' palatalization of the preceding consonant takes place, and the vowel is pronounced in the same way as at the beginning of a word. It therefore marks a morpheme boundary before and, in Belarusian, is a letter of the alphabet (as the hard sign in Russian is) rather than a simple punctuation mark in English, as it is not a punctuation mark in Belarusian. It appears frequently in Ukrainian, as, for instance, in the words: () 'five', () 'departure', () 'united', () 'to clear up, explain', () play (drama), etc. *In Russian language, Russian and some derived alphabets, the same function has been served by the hard sign (ъ, formerly called ''yer''). But the apostrophe saw some use as a substitute after 1918, when Soviet authorities enforced an orthographic reform by confiscating movable type bearing the hard sign from stubborn printing houses in Petrograd. *In some Latin transliterations of certain Cyrillic alphabets (for Belarusian language, Belarusian, Romanization of Russian, Russian, and Ukrainian language, Ukrainian), the apostrophe is used to replace thesoft sign
The soft sign (Ь, ь, italics ) also known as the front yer, front jer, or er malak (lit. "small er") is a letter of the Cyrillic script. In Old Church Slavonic, it represented a short (or "reduced") front vowel. As with its companion, the b ...
(ь, indicating palatalization of the preceding consonant), e.g., ''Русь'' is transliterated ''Kievan Rus', Rus''' according to the BGN/PCGN system. (The Prime (symbol)#Use in linguistics, prime symbol is also used for the same purpose.) Some of these transliteration schemes use a Modifier letter double apostrophe, double apostrophe ( ˮ ) to represent the apostrophe in Ukrainian and Belarusian text and the hard sign (ъ) in Russian text, e.g. Ukrainian ' ('Slavic') is transliterated as '.
*Some Karelian language, Karelian orthographies use an apostrophe to indicate palatalization, e.g. ' ('to give advice'), ' ('just (like)'), ' ('to revive').
To separate morphemes
Some languages use the apostrophe to separate the root (linguistics), root of a word and its affixes, especially if the root is foreign and unassimilated. (For another kind of morphemic separation see #Miscellaneous uses in other languages, pinyin, below.) * In Danish language, Danish an apostrophe is sometimes used to join the enclitic definite article to words of foreign origin, or to other words that would otherwise look awkward. For example, one would write ' to mean "the IP address". There is some variation in what is considered "awkward enough" to warrant an apostrophe; for instance, long-established words such as ' ('company') or ' ('level') might be written ' and ', but will generally be seen without an apostrophe. Due to Danish influence, this usage of the apostrophe can also be seen in Norwegian, but is non-standard – a hyphen should be used instead: e.g. (the CD). *In Estonian language, Estonian, apostrophes can be used in the declension of some foreign names to separate the stem from any declension endings; e.g., ' (genitive case) or ' (illative case) of ''Monet'' (name of the famous painter). *In Finnish language, Finnish, apostrophes are used in the declension of foreign names or loan words that end in a consonant when written but are pronounced with a vowel ending, e.g. ' ('in a show'), ' ('to Bordeaux'). For Finnish as well as Swedish language, Swedish, there is a closely related colon (punctuation)#Suffix separator, use of the colon. *In Polish language, Polish, the apostrophe is used exclusively for marking inflections of words and word-like elements (but not acronyms – a hyphen is used instead) whose spelling conflicts with the normal rules of inflection. This mainly affects foreign words and names. For instance, one would correctly write ' for "Al Gore's campaign". In this example, ' is spelled without an apostrophe, since its spelling and pronunciation fit into normal Polish rules; but ' needs the apostrophe, because ''e'' disappears from the pronunciation, changing the inflection pattern. This rule is often misunderstood as calling for an apostrophe after ''all'' foreign words, regardless of their pronunciation, yielding the incorrect ', for example. The effect is akin to the greengrocers' apostrophe (see above). *In Turkish language, Turkish, noun#Proper nouns and common nouns, proper nouns are capitalised and an apostrophe is inserted between the noun and any following inflectional suffix, e.g. ' ("in Istanbul"), contrasting with ' ("in school", ' is a common noun) and ' ('Istanbulite', ''-lu'' is a derivational suffix). *In Welsh language, Welsh the apostrophe is used with infixed pronouns in order to distinguish them from the preceding word (e.g. ', 'and my sister' as opposed to ', 'about a sister').Miscellaneous uses in other languages
*In Breton language, Breton, the combination ' is used for the consonant (like ''ch'' in English ''Loch Ness''), while ' is used for the consonant (as in French ' or English ''she''). *In Czech language, Czech, an apostrophe is used for writing to indicate spoken or informal language where the writer wants to express the natural way of informal speech, but it should not be used in formal text or text of a serious nature. E.g., instead of ' ('he read'), the word form ' is used. ' is the informal variant of the verb form ', at least in some varieties. These two words are the same in meaning, but to use the informal form gives the text a more natural tone, as though a friend were talking to you. Furthermore, the same as in the Slovak case above holds for lowercase ''t'' and ''d'', and for the two-digit year notation. *In Finnish language, Finnish, one of the consonant gradation patterns is the change of a ''k'' into a Hiatus (linguistics), hiatus, e.g. ' → ' ('a pile' → 'a pile's'). This hiatus has to be indicated in spelling with an apostrophe if a long vowel or a diphthong would be immediately followed by the final vowel, e.g. ' → ', ' → '. (This is in contrast to compound words, where the equivalent problem is solved with ahyphen
The hyphen is a punctuation mark used to join words and to separate syllables of a single word. The use of hyphens is called hyphenation. ''Son-in-law'' is an example of a hyphenated word. The hyphen is sometimes confused with dashes (figure d ...
, e.g. ', 'land area'.) Similarly, the apostrophe is used to mark the hiatus (linguistics), hiatus (contraction) that occurs in poetry, e.g. ' for ' ('where is').
*Galician cuisine, Galician restaurants sometimes use ' in their names instead of the standard article ' ('the').
*In Luganda, Ganda, ' (pronounced ) is used in place of ''ŋ'' on keyboards where this character is not available. The apostrophe distinguishes it from the letter combination ' (pronounced ), which has separate use in the language. Compare this with the Swahili usage below.
*In Hebrew, the ''geresh'' (a diacritic similar to the apostrophe and often represented by one) is used for several purposes other than to mark an elision:
**As an adjacent to letters to show sounds that are not represented in the Hebrew alphabet: Sounds such as (English ''j'' as in ''job''), (English ''th'' as in ''thigh''), and (English ''ch'' as in ''check'') are indicated using ג, ת, and צ with a ''geresh'' (informally ''chupchik''). For example, the name ''George'' is spelled in Hebrew (with representing the first and last consonants).
**To denote a Hebrew numerals, Hebrew numeral (e.g., , which stands for '50')
**To denote a Hebrew letter which stands for itself (e.g., – the letter ''mem'')
**Gershayim (a double geresh) to denote a Hebrew letter name (e.g., – the letter ''lamed'')
**Another (rarer) use of geresh is to denote the last syllable (which in some cases, but not all, is a suffix) in some words of Yiddish etymology, origin (e.g., ).
**In the Middle Ages and the Early modern period, gershayim were also used to denote foreign words, as well as a means of Emphasis (typography), emphasis.
* In Italian, an apostrophe is sometimes used as a substitute for a Grave accent, grave or an acute accent. This may be done after an initial E or an accented final vowel (when writing in all-capitals), or when the proper form of the letter is unavailable for technical reasons. So a sentence beginning ('It is true that...') may be written as . This form is often seen in newspapers, as it is the only case of an accent above the cap height and its omission permits the text to be more closely spaced (leading). Less commonly, a forename like might be rendered as ''Niccolo'', or ''NICCOLO''; ''perché'', as ''perche'', or ''PERCHE''. This applies only to machine or computer writing, in the absence of a suitable keyboard.
* In Jèrriais, one of the uses of the apostrophe is to mark gemination, or consonant length: For example, ' represents , ' , ' , ' , and ' (contrasted with , , , , and ).
* In Lithuanian language, Lithuanian, the apostrophe is occasionally used to add a Lithuanized ending on an international word, e.g.- "parking'as", "Skype'as", "Facebook'as".
* In standard Lojban orthography, the apostrophe is a letter in its own right (called ) that can appear only between two vowels, and is phonemically realised as either voiceless glottal fricative, [h] or, more rarely, voiceless dental fricative, [θ].
*In Macedonian language, Macedonian the apostrophe is sometimes used to represent the sound schwa, which can be found on dialectal levels, but not in the Standard Macedonian.
*In Slovak language, Slovak, the caron over lowercase ''t'', ''d'', ''l'', and uppercase ''L'' consonants resembles an apostrophe, for example, ''ď'', ''ť'', ''ľ'', and ''Ľ''. This is especially so in certain common typographic renderings. But it is non-standard to use an apostrophe instead of the caron. There is also ''l'' with an acute accent: ''ĺ'', ''Ĺ''. In Slovak the apostrophe is properly used only to indicate elision
In linguistics, an elision or deletion is the omission of one or more sounds (such as a vowel, a consonant, or a whole syllable) in a word or phrase. However, these terms are also used to refer more narrowly to cases where two words are run toget ...
in certain words (', as an abbreviated form of ' ('you are'), or ' for ' ('up')); however, these elisions are restricted to poetry (with a few exceptions). Moreover, the apostrophe is also used before a two-digit year number (to indicate the omission of the first two digits): ' (usually used for 1987).
* In Swahili language, Swahili, an apostrophe after ' shows that there is no sound of after the sound; that is, that the ' is pronounced as in English ''singer'', not as in English ''finger''.
* In Switzerland, the apostrophe is used as thousands separator alongside the fixed space (e.g., 2'000'000 or for two million) in all four languages of Switzerland, national languages.
* In the new Uzbek alphabet, Uzbek Latin alphabet adopted in 2000, the apostrophe serves as a diacritic, diacritical mark to distinguish different phonemes written with the same letter: it differentiates ' (corresponding to Cyrillic ''Short U (Cyrillic), ў'') from ', and ' (Cyrillic ''Ghayn, ғ'') from '. This avoids the use of special characters, allowing Uzbek to be typed with ease in ordinary ASCII on any Latin keyboard. In addition, a postvocalic apostrophe in Uzbek represents the glottal stop phoneme derived from Arabic ''hamzah'' or ''Ayin, 'ayn'', replacing Cyrillic ''Yer, ъ''.
*In English Yorkshire dialect, the apostrophe is used to represent the word ''the'', which is contracted to a more glottal (or 'unreleased') /t/ sound. Most users will write ''in t'barn'' ('in the barn'), ''on t'step'' ('on the step'); and those unfamiliar with Yorkshire speech will often make these sound like ''intuh barn'' and ''ontuh step''. A more accurate rendition might be ''in't barn'' and ''on't step'', though even this does not truly convey correct Yorkshire pronunciation as the ''t'' is more like a glottal stop
The glottal plosive or stop is a type of consonantal sound used in many spoken languages, produced by obstructing airflow in the vocal tract or, more precisely, the glottis. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents thi ...
.
*In the pinyin (hànyǔ pīnyīn) system of romanization for Standard Chinese, an apostrophe is often loosely said to separate syllables in a word where ambiguity could arise. Example: the standard romanization for the name of the city ''Xī'ān'' includes an apostrophe to distinguish it from a single-syllable word '. More strictly, however, it is standard to place an apostrophe only before every ''a'', ''e'', or ''o'' that starts a new syllable after the first if it is not preceded by a hyphen or a dash. Examples: ''Tiananmen, Tiān'ānmén'', ''Yǎ'ān''; but simply ''Jǐnán'', in which the syllables are ''ji'' and ''nan'', since the absence of an apostrophe shows that the syllables are not ''jin'' and ''an'' (contrast ''Jīn'ān''). This is a kind of morpheme-separation marking (see #To separate morphemes, above).
*In the largely superseded Wade-Giles, Wade–Giles romanization for Standard Chinese, an apostrophe marks Aspiration (phonetics), aspiration of the preceding consonant sound. Example: in ''tsê'' (pinyin ''ze'') the consonant represented by ''ts'' is unaspirated, but in ''ts'ê'' (pinyin ''ce'') the consonant represented by ''ts'' is aspirated. Some academic users of the system write this character as a spiritus asper ( or ) or single left (opening) quotation mark (‘).
*In some systems of romanization for the Japanese, the apostrophe is used between Mora (linguistics), moras in ambiguous situations, to differentiate between, for example, ' and ' + '. (This is similar to the practice in Pinyin mentioned above.)
*In science fiction and fantasy, the apostrophe is often used in fictional names, sometimes to indicate a glottal stop
The glottal plosive or stop is a type of consonantal sound used in many spoken languages, produced by obstructing airflow in the vocal tract or, more precisely, the glottis. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents thi ...
(for example Mitth'raw'nuruodo in ''Star Wars''), but also sometimes simply for decoration.
Typographic form
The shape of the apostrophe originated in manuscript writing, as a point with a downwards tail curving clockwise. This form was inherited by the typographic apostrophe, , also known as the typeset apostrophe (or, informally, the curly apostrophe). Later sans-serif typefaces had stylised apostrophes with a more geometric or simplified form, but usually retaining the same directional bias as a closing quotation mark. With the invention of the typewriter, a "neutral" or "straight" shape quotation mark, , was created to represent a number of different glyphs with a single keystroke: the apostrophe, both the opening and the closing single quotation marks, the single prime (symbol), primes, and on some typewriters even the exclamation point (by backspacing and overprinting with a period). This is known as the typewriter apostrophe or 'vertical apostrophe'. The same convention was adopted for double quotation marks (). Both simplifications carried over to computer keyboards and the ASCII character set.Informal use in measurement and mathematics
Formally, the symbol used to represent a Foot (unit), foot of length, depth, or height, is (prime) and that for the inch is (double prime). (Thus, for example, the notation signifies 5 feet and 7 inches). Similarly, the prime symbol is the formal representation of a minute of arc (1/60 of a Degree (angle), degree in geometry and geomatics), and double prime represents a second of arc (for example, 17°54′32″ represents 17 degrees 54 minutes and 32 seconds). Similarly in mathematics, the prime is generally used to generate more variable names for similar things without resorting to subscripts, with ''x''′ generally meaning something related to (or derived from) ''x''. Because of the very close similarity of the typewriter apostrophe and typewriter double quote to prime and double prime, substitution in informal contexts is ubiquitous but they are deprecated in contexts where proper typography is important. There is also a risk of an automatic process 'correcting' a typewriter apostrophe to a typographic apostrophe, which will not make sense if a prime symbol was intended.Unicode
In its Unicode Standard (version 13.0), the Unicode Consortium describes three characters that represent apostrophe: *: The typewriter or ASCII apostrophe. The standard remarks: * is preferred where the character is to represent a punctuation mark, as for contractions: "we’ve", and the code is also referred to as a ''punctuation apostrophe''. The closing single quote and the apostrophe were unified in Unicode 2.1 "to correct problems in the mapping tables from CP1252, Windows and Mac Roman, Macintosh code pages." This can make searching text more difficult as quotes and apostrophes cannot be distinguished without context. * is preferred where the apostrophe is to represent a modifier letter (for example, in transliterations to indicate a glottal stop). In the latter case, it is also referred to as a ''letter apostrophe''. The letter apostrophe may be used, for example, in transliterations to represent the Arabicglottal stop
The glottal plosive or stop is a type of consonantal sound used in many spoken languages, produced by obstructing airflow in the vocal tract or, more precisely, the glottis. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents thi ...
(''hamza'') or the Cyrillic "soft sign
The soft sign (Ь, ь, italics ) also known as the front yer, front jer, or er malak (lit. "small er") is a letter of the Cyrillic script. In Old Church Slavonic, it represented a short (or "reduced") front vowel. As with its companion, the b ...
", or in some orthographies such as ' of Breton language, Breton, where this combination is an independent Digraphs and trigraphs, trigraph. ICANN considers this the proper character for Ukrainian alphabet, Ukrainian apostrophe within Internationalized domain name, IDNs. This character is rendered identically to in the Unicode code charts, and the standard cautions that one should never assume this code is used in any language.
Characters similar to apostrophe
* * * * * Hawaiian ''okina'' and for the transliteration of Arabic and Hebrew ''ʻayn''. * * * Arabic ''hamza'' and Hebrew ''alef''. * Arabic and Hebrew ''ʿayin''. * Stress accent or dynamic accent. * * One of two characters for glottal stop in Nenets languages, Nenets. * * Also known as combining Greek ''Smooth breathing, psili''. * Also known as combining Greek ''Rough breathing, dasia''. * * * Identical to U+0313. * Also known as Greek '. * * * * * * * * (or turned comma, which can mark a letter's omission) * * * * * ''Saltillo (linguistics), Saltillo'' of the languages of Mexico. * * Fullwidth form of the typewriter apostrophe.Computing
In modern computing practice, Unicode is the standard and default method for character encoding. However, Unicode itself and many legacy applications have echoes of earlier practices. Furthermore, the limited character set provided by computer keyboards has also required practical and pragmatic adjustments. These issues are detailed below.ASCII encoding
The typewriter apostrophe, , was inherited by computer keyboards, and is the only apostrophe character (computing), character available in the (7-bit) ASCII character encoding, at code value Hexadecimal, 0x27 (39). In ASCII, it may be used to represent any of left single quotation mark, right single quotation mark, apostrophe, vertical line or prime (symbol), prime (punctuation marks), or an acute accent (modifier letters). Many earlier (pre-1985) computer displays and printers rendered the ASCII apostrophe as a typographic apostrophe, and rendered the grave accent ('back tick', 0x60, 96) as a matching left single quotation mark. This allowed a more typographic appearance of text:``I can't'' would appear as on these systems. This can still be seen in many documents prepared at that time, and is still used in the TeX typesetting system to create typographic quotes.
Typographic apostrophe in 8-bit encodings
Support for the typographic apostrophe ( ’ ) was introduced in several 8-bit character encodings, such as the Classic Mac OS, Apple Macintosh operating system's Mac Roman character set (in 1984), and later in the CP1252 encoding of Microsoft Windows. Both sets also used this code point for a closing single quote. There is no such character in ISO 8859-1. The Microsoft Windows Windows code page, code page CP1252 (sometimes incorrectly called ''ANSI'' or ''ISO-Latin'') contains the typographic apostrophe at 0x92. Due to "smart quotes" in Microsoft software converting the ASCII apostrophe to this value, other software makers have been effectively forced to adopt this as a ''de facto'' convention. For instance, the HTML5 standard specifies that this value is interpreted as this character from CP1252. Some earlier non-Microsoft browsers would display a '?' for this and make web pages composed with Microsoft software somewhat hard to read.Entering apostrophes
Although ubiquitous in typeset material, the typographic apostrophe ( ’ ) is rather difficult to enter on a computer, since it does not have its own key on a standard keyboard. Outside the world of professional typesetting and graphic design, many people do not know how to enter this character and instead use the typewriter apostrophe ( ' ). The typewriter apostrophe has always been considered tolerable on Web pages because of the egalitarian nature of Web publishing, the low resolution of computer monitors in comparison to print, and legacy limitations provided by ASCII. More recently, the standard use of the typographic apostrophe is becoming more common on the Web due to the wide adoption of theUnicode
Unicode, formally The Unicode Standard,The formal version reference is is an information technology Technical standard, standard for the consistent character encoding, encoding, representation, and handling of Character (computing), text expre ...
text encoding standard, higher-resolution displays, and advanced spatial anti-aliasing, anti-aliasing of text in modern operating systems. Because typewriter apostrophes are now often automatically converted to typographic apostrophes by word processor, word processing and desktop publishing software, the typographic apostrophe does often appear in documents produced by non-professionals, albeit sometimes incorrectly—see the section "Smart Quotes" below.
XML (and hence XHTML) defines an ' character entity reference for the ASCII typewriter apostrophe. ' is officially supported in HTML since HTML 5. It is ''not'' defined in HTML 4 despite all the other predefined character entities from XML being defined. If it cannot be entered literally in HTML, a numeric character reference could be used instead, such as ' or '.
In the HTML entity ’ the ''rsquo'' is short for right single quotation mark.
Smart quotes
To make typographic apostrophes easier to enter, word processing and publishing software often convert typewriter apostrophes to typographic apostrophes during text entry (at the same time converting opening and closing single and double quotes to their standard left-handed or right-handed forms). A similar facility may be offered on web servers after submitting text in a form field, e.g. on weblogs or free encyclopedias. This is known as the ''smart quotes'' feature; apostrophes and quotation marks that are not automatically altered by computer programs are known as ''dumb quotes''. Such conversion is not always correct. Smart quotes features often incorrectly convert a leading apostrophe to an opening quotation mark (e.g., in abbreviations of years: ''‘29'' rather than the correct ''’29'' for the years ''1929'' or ''2029'' (depending on context); or ''‘twas'' instead of ''’twas'' as the archaism, archaic abbreviation of ''it was''). Smart quote features also often fail to recognise situations when a prime (symbol), prime rather than an apostrophe is needed; for example, incorrectly rendering the latitude 49° 53′ 08″ as 49° 53’ 08”. In Microsoft Word it is possible to turn smart quotes off (in some versions, by navigating through ''Tools'', ''AutoCorrect'', ''AutoFormat as you type'', and then unchecking the appropriate option). Alternatively, typing Control-Z (for ''Undo'') immediately after entering the apostrophe will convert it back to a typewriter apostrophe. In Microsoft Word for Windows, holding down the Control key while typing two apostrophes will produce a single typographic apostrophe.Programming
Some programming languages, like Pascal (programming language), Pascal, use the ASCII apostrophe to delimit string literals. In many languages, including JavaScript, ECMAScript, and Python (programming language), Python, either the apostrophe or the double quote may be used, allowing string literals to contain the other character (but not to contain both without using an escape character), e.g.foo = 'He said "Bar!"';. Strings delimited with apostrophes are often called ''single quoted''. Some languages, such as Perl, PHP, and many shell languages, treat single quoted strings as "raw" strings, while double quoted strings have expressions (such as "$variable") replaced with their values when interpreted.
The C (programming language), C programming language (and many List of C-family programming languages, derived languages like C++, Java (programming language), Java, C Sharp (programming language), C#, and Scala (programming language), Scala) uses apostrophes to delimit a character literal. In these languages a character is a different object than a one-letter string.
In C++, since C++14, apostrophes can be included as optional digit separators in numeric literals.
In Visual Basic (and earlier Microsoft BASIC dialects such as QuickBASIC) an apostrophe is used to denote the start of a comment.
In the Lisp (programming language), Lisp family of programming languages, an apostrophe is shorthand for the quote operator.
In Rust (programming language), Rust, in addition to being used to delimit a character literal, an apostrophe can start an explicit Object lifetime, lifetime.
See also
*Apologetic apostrophe *Caron *Contraction (grammar) *Elision *Genitive case *Modifier letter double apostrophe *Possessive caseNotes and references
Notes
References
Bibliography
*External links
"Obsessed with Possessives"
The Carolina Chapter of the Society for Technical Communication article on apostrophe use with possessives.
The apostrophe character
Problems representing apostrophes on computers
The Apostrophe Protection Society
The Dreaded Apostrophe: An approach using a single rule only
How to use an apostrophe
The Oatmeal
"How the Past Affects the Future: The Story of the Apostrophe"
by Christina Cavella and Robin A. Kernodle
A humorous guide to proper and improper usage of the apostrophe
18 March 2013
The Ultimate Flowchart to Using Apostrophes (Infographic)
{{Navbox diacritical marks Latin-script diacritics English orthography Hebrew diacritics Punctuation