Even Greener Pastures

@Alharacas

Idiot's apostrophe - I love that. I think I'm lucky because my short-term memory is quite poor so I don't tend to unlearn things (this obviously only works in your favour if what you learned in the first place is correct). However, I have experienced moments where I hesitated after almost writing "it's" where there should be "its". This is something I wouldn't have done years ago when I was learning English at school.

@SHL

I know what you mean about words ending with "s". Those words just never look right. I was writing a post about the log Alharacas had started and I wrote "Alharacas' idea" and I was just staring at it because it looked wrong.

In theory, what doesn't have any function in language stops being used but in this case, it's being overused instead. I mean, it does have some function. Without the apostrophe, you wouldn't know if something belongs to one person or a group of people (my sister's clothes vs my sisters' clothes) but it can also cause confusion because it looks like the contracted form of the verb "to be". If you say "John's cold", does it mean "John is cold" or "John's cold (is getting worse)"?

That’s a very good point, Nikola. When you contract the verb to be, you end up with John‘s cold (he feels cold) and also John‘s cold (the illness) and it is ambiguous. I think educated people recognize this and use alternatives. For instance, I might say „John‘s cold“ (he‘s feeling cold), but if I were writing it out or sensed any ambiguity in the context I was speaking, would just say, „John is cold.“ That resolves the problem. Rarely would I just say „John‘s cold (the illness) without more context, like „John‘s cold is not getting better“ and that resolves the ambiguity too. So, yes, there is the potential for ambiguity, but I think we work around it to be clear.


Actually in law, I‘ve found ways around the use of the apostrophe in cases where plurals are used and need to show possession. So, for example, in a civil case the person suing is the plaintiff and the party being sued the defendant. (German uses the same sort of terms, der Kläger (plaintiff), der Beklagte (defendant) in civil cases).  Coincidentally, German law changed the words in 2003 in divorce cases, just like California did in 1970, to soften up the feel of a divorce on the parties to make them feel one wasn’t really “suing“ the other, like in a civil case, which was just a semantics game since nothing else really changed. So, according to my attorney friend, in a modern German divorce case, the former Kläger is now der Antragsteller (what we call a Petitioner), and the opposing party is der Antragsgegner (we call a Respondent). (Of course, I gave the masculine of the nouns as examples and the words would change a bit if I were referring to females, like a man would be der Antragsteller, a woman die Antragstellerin.)

Instead of the apostrophe, I fall back on „of“ to avoid it in civil cases with multiple plaintiffs and defendants. For example, I would write the title to a specific pleading in court like this: „Opposition of Plaintiffs to Demurrer of Defendants to First Amended Complaint.“ That way I avoid the clumsy looking „Plaintiffs‘ Opposition to Defendants‘ Demurrer to First Amended Complaint.“

I just think it stylistically looks a lot better to avoid that apostrophe at the end of a plural noun ending in „ s“ by flipping the words around and using „of“ instead. A few lawyers will still write it with the apostrophe, but I learned a long time ago how to play with the words to avoid it.