Plurals and Possessives
- 1 Basic rules for forming plurals
- 2 Irregular plural forms
- 3 Plural and possessive units of time
- 4 Forming plural compound nouns
- 5 Forming plural proper nouns
- 6 Plural personal titles
- 7 Forming plural academic titles
- 8 Forming plural when singular is dictated
- 9 Plural forms of abbreviations
- 10 Plural forms for microorganisms
- 11 Nouns that are false plurals
- 12 Nouns that are false singulars
- 13 Use of parenthetical plurals
- 14 Use of bilateral as a plural or singular form
- 15 Forming plurals of foreign nouns and terms
- 16 Basic rules for forming possessives
- 17 Forming possessive pronouns
- 18 Posessive forms of organizational names
- 19 Forming possessive compound nouns
- 20 Possessive forms of abbreviations
- 21 Eliminating possessive form of eponyms
- 22 Forming separate and joint possession
- 23 Possessives standing alone (solitary possessives)
- 24 Rules for inanimate objects and possessives
- 25 Possessives preceding verbal nouns
- 26 Use of possessives in of prepositional phrases
Plurals
Simply put, the plural form of a noun indicates that there is more than one object. For most nouns, plurals are formed by adding an "s" at the end of the word.
EXCEPTIONS: Use an apostrophe before the s where confusion might otherwise result
too many I's
two U's
Where the context is clear, no apostrophe is necessary.
He gets As in school.
There were several type Os in the study group.
Some nouns ending in "o" are pluralized by adding "es." There is no simple rule to explain the difference.
hero/heroes
echo/echoes
potato/potatoes
If uncertain, look the word up in a dictionary.
Possessives
Merriam-Webster definition of possessive: " 1: of, relating to, or constituting a word, a word group, or a grammatical case that denotes ownership or a relation analogous to ownership 2: manifesting possession or the desire to own or dominate."
Simply put, possessives indicate a relationship of possession.
The following four phrases are similar but each has a distinct meaning.
my sister's friend's investments (the investments belonging to a friend of my sister)
my sister's friends' investments (the investments belonging to several friends of my sister)
my sisters' friend's investments (the investments belonging to a friend of several of my sisters)
my sisters' friends' investments (the investments belonging to several friends of several of my sisters)
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