Embedded Files
Common Mistakes
Common Mistakes
This is the John’s book.
This is John’s book.
The lesson of Tuesday is canceled.
Tuesday’s lesson is canceled.
The Trump’s administration made many mistakes.
The Trump administration made many mistakes.
This is a typical everyday’s problem.
This is a typical everyday problem.
This is an Alfred Hitchcock’s movie.
This is an Alfred Hitchcock movie.
I read a Harry Potter’s book.
I read a Harry Potter book / I read one of the books about Harry Potter.
Correct Form
Correct Form
My wife writes history books. She is writing a book on the history of England.
Look at this bookshelf. The books on the left are my books (i.e. books that I have bought) and those on the right are my wife’s (i.e. books that she has bought).
My sister’s husband is not coming to tomorrow’s party.
I have many friends. I went to my friends’ party (i.e. Jack and Jill’s party) last night. The night before, I went to my friend’s house (i.e. Pete’s house).
Guidelines
Guidelines
The genitive (possessive form) is formed by adding ’s after a singular noun, or simply an apostrophe (’) after a plural noun or a noun that already ends in s (NB s’s is also possible).
The genitive indicates that something belongs to someone, to some group of people or to some animal e.g. John’s book (this generally means that the book was bought by John and thus belongs to John).
When we are talking about the author of a book or the director of a movie, often the genitive is not used. Compare I read a good Stephen King book vs Stephen King’s new book is called xxx. I like Woody Allen movies vs Woody Allen’s last movie was called xxx.
The genitive can also be used in certain expressions of time and distance e.g. I am going a three weeks’ time. It’s a minute’s walk from here.
The genitive is not normally used with animate objects.
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