Apostrophes

Apostrophes have two main uses: to indicate possession and to indicate contractions. Most difficulties occur with the first use or with using the apostrophe to form regular plurals.

"Janet's" needs an apostrophe to show that the market belongs to her, but since nothing is possessed by the "feature's," that apostrophe is misleading and should be deleted.

1. Indicating Possession. In the strictest sense the relationship of possession is the relationship of ownership. In writing, this relationship is indicated by adding an 's to show singular possession and to show plural possession when the standard plural form doesn't end in s. Possessives of plurals that end in s are formed by adding just the apostrophe.

Singular possessives: the boy's hands, the heart's heat, the dog's fleas, Monday's paper, the bass's scales, Charles's snowshoes.

Plural possessives: the boys' hands, the dogs' fleas, the basses' scales, the geese's honking, the women's caucus, the mice's holiday.

Notice that while possession often includes ownership, it sometimes does not. For example, while Charles clearly owns his snowshoes, it's less clear that the dog owns its fleas. In fact, the fleas may think they own the dog. Still, granting the absence of legal ownership, we can say that the dog "has" fleas. But what about Monday's paper? The paper is not possessed by a day of the week. Yet we consider it to be the "paper of Monday" just as the fleas are "the fleas of the dog." Somehow they go together. That's what the apostrophe shows us.

2. Indicating Contractions. The apostrophe can also indicate that letters have been left out of a word or that numbers have been dropped from a date. Notice that the apostrophe goes in the place that the letters or numbers have been removed from, not at the spot where the two contracted words are joined together.

A Special Case

One word that doesn't conform to the guidelines above is "its." Because the word is used so frequently, it's worth learning its ways. When "its" is a contraction for "it is," it takes an apostrophe. When "its" indicates possession, no apostrophe is used. 

Change:	Its a shame that it's wings were damaged.
to:	It's a shame that its wings were damaged.

The first "its" is a contraction for "it is." The second is a possessive and therefore needs no apostrophe.

Activity

4.21 Edit the following sentences for apostrophes.

a. The cookie's Bobs mother made tasted like baking soda.

b. Thats what happen's when she lets the kid's help.

c. The snow's crust had been broken in several place's.

d. If youre looking for Patti, shes down at the Womens Crisis Center.

e. Todays newspaper brought more conflicting reports on the hostages' release.

f. Its not its color that I object to. Its its strange shape.

g. Those boys hand's were caked with clay from the mines entrance.

Question Marks

Question marks show that a statement should be read as a question. Although it might make more sense, as in Spanish, to put question marks at both the beginning and end of the question, in English the question mark comes only at the end.

You're twenty-five years old?

When will we get there?

Who ate Rodney's bananas?

Is it really that simple?

Exclamation Marks

Exclamation mark indicate that a statement is extremely important or is spoken in a loud voice. Use them sparingly. Otherwise, your writing can sound like shouting all the way through; and when you need to raise your voice, you'll be stuck for a way to do it except with multiple marks, which is not recommended.

Just as inflation hits our dollars so that we need two or three to do what one could do in the past, so it can hit our language. Simply turning down the volume is an effective way to fight verbal inflation.

Activity

4.22 Punctuate the following sentences. In some cases, the best punctuation will depend on what you want to make the unpunctuated sentence mean.

a. Isnt that Roberts boat over there by the cove

b. When youve done your best youve got nothing to apologize for. c. I know its easy for some people but I always have trouble.

d. Ouch thats my foot youre standing on.

e. The Royals the Rangers and the Angels all have a shot at the pennant but none of them will get past the Pirates.

f. After settling into our pace we knew we could go the distance. g. These shoes which cost me $60.00 havent worn well at all and theyve never been comfortable.

h. I hate to tell you this Bob but I just sat on your lunch.

i. Natalie my favorite aunt ate supper with us last night we had a wonderful time.

j. All up and down both sides of the block people came rushing outside to watch the parade pass.

k. When I go to the beach I just like to lie in the sun watch the people and maybe play a little Frisbee where I go the ocean is much too cold for swimming.

1. That car has more than good mileage I'm thinking about its styling performance and reliability.

m. Once you find the key which is never in the same place twice the rest is easy.

n. Helicopter pilots who don't have common sense dont live long.

o. If you can do all these correctly which isnt easy you can feel pretty good about your skill with commas, apostrophes, periods, question marks, and exclamation marks.

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