Apostrophe

The apostrophe is used in many languages. Its chief purpose is to indicate a missing letter. So, for example, in French, "l'armoire" means "the wardrobe", and is composed of "armoire" preceded by "la", which drops the "a" before another vowel: the apostrophe is there to acknowledge this.

Use in English

In English it behaves not unlike a letter: it has three pronunciations (í, schwa, and a glottal stop); but it is most often silent. (The accents show stress and pronunciation, as in English phonemes.) Because of this tendency to silence, and its punctuation-like appearance, it tends to be misused. On blogs, no matter what the general standard of literacy, one can see apostrophes wrongly inserted in plurals ("plural's") and many examples of ít's where there should be íts. Throughout the world there exist notices in which the writer shows off his or her supposed familiarity with English by inserting an apostrophe into an ordinary plural, as for example: LOT’S OF BARGAIN’S! which should read simply: LOTS OF BARGAINS! And that includes English-speaking countries: Lynne Truss calls them "greengocers' apostrophes". Conversely, apostrophes are often omitted, especially among capitals and in titles, presumably for aesthetic reasons: THE RAKES PROGRESS (The Râke's Prôgress), CHAMPIONS LEAGUE (Chámpions' Lêague), BITCHES BREW (Bítches' Breŵ: singular would be Bítch’s Breŵ – Miles Davis presumably did not intend a statement about the brewing habits of bitches). It is hard not to sympathise with the periodic calls for the apostrophes abolition (and, as exemplified in this sentence, omitting it reads easily enough).

The apostrophe is often pronounced like í in ís (though all these are schwa in Australasian English): in possessive nouns after -s, -x, -z, -ce, -se, -ch, and -sh: Jônes’s càr, Méndez’s hòuse, Rêese’s dóg, wítch’s breŵ, Bùsh’s pólicy (all -zíz) Bíx’s bánquet, the fóx’s tâil, Grêece’s nèighbours (all -síz). And also in the contraction of ís after -s, -x, -z, -ce, -se, -ch, -sh: the fóx’s íll, sounds like, the fóx ís íll - though the former is almost as likely to have the schwa sound. To further the complication, some writers prefer Jônes’ càr &c. but two s’s are heard (if not it’d be Jôan’s càr).

In róck’n’rôll and other combinations with weak forms represented by a single letter, which are usually commercial, e.g. Tŏys’r’Ús ®, the first apostrophe is schwa and the second silent. And the schwa sound begins -n’t (contraction of nót): coùldn’t, dídn’t, hádn’t, ŏughtn’t, shoùldn’t, mústn’t, hásn’t - though the apostrophe, signalling the omitted ó of nót, must come after the n.

But where -n’t follows a vowel sound, the apostrophe is silent: dãren’t, wëren’t, cān’t, shān’t. As it is also when it substitutes for the í in ís, and in the possessives, provided that the preceding letter is not -s, -x, -z, -ce, or -se: Pêter’s boòk. Pêter’s íll. The dóg’s ángry. The gòvernment’s crâzy. The apostrophe is silent also in the very common contractions hê’s, Î’m, wê’re, thèy’d, yoû’ve, shê’ll, ít’s etc. And it’s here, with ít’s, that we come to the most common apostrophe mistake of all, as found in "It wagged it’s tail". The correct version is apostropheless like the other possessives mŷ, òur, yŏur, hís (*hízz) and hër: The dóg wágged íts tâil. It’s a perfectly logical mistake, as noun possessives do have the apostrophe: Pêter shoòk Jâne’s hánd, and so does the pronoun òne’s: Ít géts ón òne’s (*wúnz) nërves. Computer spellcheckers cannot as yet detect and correct this error; but it remains that ít’s is only allowed for the contraction of ít ís.

The full declension of a noun ending in –y

	singular	plural
normal	pàrty	pàrties
possessive	pàrty’s	pàrties’

pàrties = pàrty’s = pàrties’ - they are identically pronounced.

In the gïrls’ boòks the possessive plural apostrophe is silent and final, after the plural s of gïrls. Similarly: thê Émirates’ låws, hër bâbies’ náppies, the hŏrses’ mânes.

whose possessive = who’s contraction: these are both *hoôz and so are commonly confused: Whose boòk ís ít? I’m trŷing to fînd òut who’s tâken ít (who hás). Who’s còming? (Who is?) The përson whose mistâke ít ís ís nót ûsually the përson who’s môst bóthered by ít. The òne whose idêas are bést and who´s bést at presénting them ísn’t necessãrily the òne who´s got môst to gâin.

See also

• Spelling pronunciation
• Letter (alphabet)
• Alphabet
• Writing system
• Orthography
• Written language
• Writing