Korean Job Discussion Forums

[hellofaniceguy]

Using apostrophes....

The Johnsons are staying at....no apostrophe
vs
the Johnson's can eat at....
vs
The Johnsons' hotel is on.....

why use the apostrophe and not use it?
(I know but brain freeze on trying to explain it simple. How would you?)

[edwardcatflap]

There are two functions for the apostrophe.

One is to show that there is something missing or contracted as in 'it's great' (missing i) or he's just arrived (missing 'ha')

The other function shows that something belongs to someone as in 'this is John's book'

Recently, people have started to use an apostophe to signify plurals which they think look strange without something to indicate they are plurals such as Cd's, the 1950's etc...

Other people have taken this further and have started to use apostrophes for regular plurals such as video's or coffee's etc...Usually ones that end in vowels

Other people have started to use the apostrophe for the possessive adjective as in the sentence 'Seoul is a big city, it's population is mostly Korean'.

A lot of people complain about the last three examples saying they are evidence of sloppy grammar but the first one in particular is becoming more and more commonplace and may soon be the norm.

[Sleepy in Seoul]

In the case of possessives, try to change the sentence to put the word 'of' in it e.g.:

The Johnsons' hotel is on..... The hotel of the Johnsons is on... (YES, the sentence is grammatically correct and the meaning is the same, so an apostrophe is required)
vs
the Johnson's can eat at.... The can eat of the Johnsons at... (NO, the sentence isn't grammatically correct and the meaning is different, so no apostrophe required)

You could also try explaining that you can only possess a noun, so if the word after a possessive apostrophe is not a noun (compound or otherwise), it's wrong.

[bucheon bum]

[hellofaniceguy]

I appreciate the help! Thank you all!