-(E)S, -'S and -(E)S'

The Problem

There are two ways of explaining the use of -(e)s (or plain 'ess').

First, use it when the noun:

• is a plural form,
• and is also a regular plural form.

Compare the following:

Students like studying.	They like studying.
Everyone likes students.	Everyone likes them.
The purple buses arrived on time.	They arrived on time.
I managed to buy the last authentic copies.	I managed to buy them.
One of the chickens escaped over the wall.	One of them escaped over the wall.
The bricks fell on the plates of glass.	They fell on them.

When to Use -'S

There are two ways of explaining the use of -'s (apostrophe 'ess'):

First, use it:

• whenever you want to express a genitive relationship between entities or concepts
• and also when the number characteristics of the noun are as follows:
  • with all singular nouns such as girl's
  • with irregular plural nouns such as men's

The following examples show the spelling for singular nouns:

The man's accent was very pleasant.	His accent was very pleasant.	the accent of the man was very pleasant.
The woman's reaction was positive.	Her reaction was positive.	The reaction of the woman was positive.
An author's style is a personal attribute.	His/her style is a personal attribute.	The style of an author is a personal attribute.
The car's back window was broken.	Its back window was broken.	The back window of the car was broken.
A bird's shadow appeared.	Its shadow appeared.	The shadow of a bird appeared.
All the book's pages were torn.	All its pages were torn.	All the pages of the book were torn.

The following examples show the tests for irregular plural nouns:

The men's accents were very pleasant.			Their accents were very pleasant.			The accents of the men were very pleasant.
The women's reactions were positive.			Their reactions were positive.			The reactions of the women were positive.
The mice's coats felt smooth.			Their coats felt smooth.			The coats of the mice felt smooth.
The geese's heads turned towards us.			Their heads turned towards us.			The heads of the geese turned towards us.

There is another sort of 's which is a contracted form of is. You can distinguish the contraction 's from the ending 's simply by asking yourself whether it is equivalent to is or not. Here are some examples:

the boy's laughing	the boy's brother's laughing
the girl's sitting over there	the girl's mother's sitting over there
it's cold today	its engine's cold today

Particular care should be taken to distinguish between the possessive pronoun its and it's.

In informal English, yet another 's arises through the contraction of has. You can distinguish the contraction 's from the ending 's simply by asking yourself whether it is equivalent to has or not. Here are some examples:

my brother's won the lottery	my brother's wife's won the lottery
the girl's seen the light	the girl's mother's seen the light
it's impressed everyone	its design's impressed everyone

When to Use -(E)S'

There are two ways of explaining the use of -(e)s':

First, use it:

• whenever you want to express a genitive relationship between entities or concepts.
• and also with a noun which is:
  • plural,
  • and also a regular plural form.

Here are some examples:

The girls' accents were very pleasant.	Their accents were very pleasant.	The accents of the girls were very pleasant.
The books' pages were torn.	Their pages were torn.	The pages of the books were torn.
The players' demands were modest.	Their demands were excessive.	The demands of the players were modest.
The cars' back windows were dirty.	Their back windows were dirty.	The back windows of the cars were dirty.
The birds' nests were guarded all day.	Their nests were guarded all day.	The nests of the birds were guarded all day.
All the students' demands were met.	All their demands were met.	All the demands of the students were met.

If your word satisfies these tests, then use -(e)s'.

When to Use ' rather than -'s

This section provides brief grammatical explanations of:

• The Forms and Technical Terms
• Regular and Irregular Plural Forms
• Their Sounds and Spellings
• Number
• Genitive
• Replacing Phrases
• Pronouns
• The History of these Endings

The Forms and Technical Terms

The following table summarise the forms and technical terms.

As can be seen, there are two intersecting systems:

1. Number
   • singular
   • plural
     • regular
     • irregular
2. Case
   • common
   • genitive

The endings can be named and described technically as follows:

s	plain 'ess'	this is the regular plural ending
's	apostrophe 'ess'	this is the genitive ending for (a) all singular nouns, (b) irregular plural nouns
s'	'ess' apostrophe	this is the regular plural genitive ending

Regular and Irregular Plural Forms: Their Sounds and Spellings

There are two ways of marking purals: known as regular and irregular.

In speech, regular plurals are formed by adding the following sounds to the end of a noun:

• an s sound as in cats mops bits
• a z sound as in dogs birds lids
• an iz sound as in hisses lasses horses

• in the case of the first two sounds, use s
• in the case of the third sound
  • use the letters es as with lasses
  • but use s if the word is spelled with a final 'silent e', as with horses.

Irregular plurals are formed:

• by changing a vowel within the word:
  • mouse becomes mice - note c replaces the s which is a part of the word
  • louse becomes lice - ditto
  • man becomes men
  • woman becomes women
  • foot becomes feet
  • goose becomes geese
  • tooth becomes teeth
• adding -en as in brethren children oxen
• no change as with sheep deer cod, nationality names which end in -ese such as Chinese
• foreign plurals:
  • such as stimuli algae addenda criteria
  • some foreign plurals happen to end in s as with indices bases
  • many borrowings have been regularised, especially in informal contexts as with formulas viruses areas albums.

Number

A simple explanation of the function of Number is as follows:

• Singular nouns refer to one of an entity or concept e.g. dog or idea.
• Plural nouns refer to more than one of an entity or concept e.g. dogs or ideas.

The discussion of Number is more complex than this, but this simple explanation will serve our purposes. Interested readers can consult the works in the References for details.

Genitive

The genitive is commonly associated with possession as in the student's essay. However, it can convey a number of relationships. There are problems of precise definition, but the following list gives some idea of the range of possibilities:

• possessive genitive the manager's new car cf. the manager has a car
• subjective genitive the manager's offer cf. the manager offered ...
• objective genitive the manager's dismissal cf. the board dismissed the manager
• descriptive genitive a miner's shovel cf. a shovel for a miner
• genitive of origin the manager's explanation cf. the manager gave an explanation
• genitive of measure a fortnight's holiday cf. a holiday for a fortnight
• genitive of attribute the girl's courage cf. the girl is courageous

Replacing Phrases

Replacement can used as a test for selecting the correct spelling:

• replacement by his her its indicates that -'s should be used
• replacement by they them indicates that -(e)s should be used for regular plurals
• replacement by their indicates that
  • -(e)s' should be used with regular plurals
  • but -'s with irregular plurals.

An explicit explanation of replacing phrases is beyond the aims of these notes. But there are two important points to note.

First, replacement does not always focus exclusively on the noun which takes the ending but can also include surrounding words - technically, replacement involves all words in the phrase of which the noun is the head. The following examples give some idea of the possibilities:

students	are campaigning tomorrow
the first year students	are campaigning tomorrow
the first year students in the Law Department	are campaigning tomorrow
they	are campaigning tomorrow

 

the man's	voice was clearly heard
the angry man's	voice was clearly heard
the well-built angry man's	voice was clearly heard
his	voice was clearly heard

students'	grants are under review
medical students'	grants are under review
the long-suffering medical students'	grants are under review
their	grants are under review

Second, phrases can be members of bigger phrases. This applies to the genitive phrase (i.e. the phrase which is headed by a noun which ends in 's or s'). For example, the young girl's new cars is a phrase which includes the genitive phrase the young girl's. The possessive pronouns replace the genitive phrase; for example: the young girl's new cars are outside can become her new cars are outside. The personal pronouns replace the bigger phrase; for example: the young girl's new cars are outside can become they are outside. As a rough guide to replacing nouns which can take 's or s', the replacement can include other words which precede them but not other words which follow them.

Pronouns

Words which can replace nouns or their immediate phrases are known as pronouns. In these notes, we are concerned with:

• his her its which are singular possessive pronouns and replace singular genitive nouns like boy's, girl's and car's
• their which is a plural possessive pronoun and replaces plural genitive nouns like boys', men's, girls' and cars'
• they and them which are personal pronouns which replace plural nouns - regular like boys or irregular like men.

The following table presents the forms of different types of pronouns:

I	me	myself	my	mine
he	him	himself	his	his
she	her	herself	her	hers
it	it	itself	its
we	us	ourselves	our	ours
you	you	yourself/selves	your	yours
they	them	themselves	their	theirs

 

The point to note here is that neither the 's ending nor the s' ending occurs with these pronouns. Thus, we have ourselves yourselves themselves its ours yours hers theirs and we cannot put 's nor s' in place of the final s.

However, a different type of 's can occur with some of them - it is a reduction of is and can occur as follows:

he is	he's
she is	she's
it is	it's
mine is	mine's

Care should be taken to distinguish between its and it's. Just ask yourself whether it is equivalent to it is. If so, use it's, if not use its.

The History of these Endings

Summary

-(e)s	regular plural noun	replaceable with they them
-'s	genitive noun - singular	replaceable with his her its	can sometimes be rephrased using of
-'s	genitive noun - irregular plural	replaceable with their	can sometimes be rephrased using of
-(e)s'	genitive noun - regular plural	replaceable with their	can sometimes be rephrased using of

Exercises

Plain 'ess', -(e)s

The following example contains a mixture of correct and incorrect uses of the plain -(e)s.

The days passed slowly. But at last, the postmans van came up the lane, scattering the leave's in all directions. I could not contain myself and, tripping over the dog's lead, I pushed the boxes to one side and ran to the door. The vans muddy wheel's crunched the stones. The postman got out, greeted me heartily, and handed over a parcel and three letters.

See Answers to Exercises

Apostrophe 'ess', -'s

See Answers to Exercises

'Ess' apostrophe, -(e)s'

See Answers to Exercises

Answers to Exercises

Plain 'ess', -(e)s

The days passed slowly. But at last, the postman's van came up the lane, scattering the leaves in all directions. I could not contain myself and, tripping over the dog's lead, I pushed the boxes to one side and ran to the door. The van's muddy wheels crunched the stones. The postman got out, greeted me heartily, and handed over a parcel and three letters.

Apostrophe 'ess', -'s

'Ess' apostrophe, -(e)s'

References