Apostrophes
Apostrophes are one of the most misused punctuation marks in the English language—just scrolling through the internet can confuse anyone with its countless examples of misplaced and missing apostrophes. Is it “it’s” or “its”? When do you add “ ’s”? Do you even need an apostrophe at all?
These little marks are actually quite simple to use once you know the rules! Here’s a handy guide to help you understand.
Overall
Do use: when you want to create a possessive or replace letters or numbers.
Do not use: to indicate plurality.
Possession
Generally, when you want to make a noun possessive (in other words, the noun owns something), you add an apostrophe and an “s” to the end of the word.
Example: “The airplane’s seats are blue.”
In addition, “ies” and “ ’s” are two different endings. The former is for plurals—more than one family is “families”—and the latter is for possession—an instance of a specific “landing gear malfunction” is “the landing gear’s malfunction.”
Words ending in “s” are trickier; sometimes you’ll add an apostrophe and an “s,” and sometimes simply an apostrophe. (For example: “Mrs. Jones’s” or “Mrs. Jones’.”) The style guide given to you when you were hired will tell you which one to use.
Character Replacement
You can also put an apostrophe in place of missing letters or numerals, such as in contractions and informal word shortening or for abbreviated years (in some style guides; remember to refer to yours for guidance).
Missing letters examples:
“Your suitcase is too big, and it’s not going to fit in the overhead bin.” (This is the correct spelling of the contraction of “it is”; if it did not have an apostrophe, it would denote possession.)
“I don’t like those designs. Just get rid of ’em.” (Note which way the apostrophe curls in “ ’em.”)
“My brain’s too tired to deal with this right now.” (“Brain’s” is a combination of “brain” and “is.”)
Abbreviated years example (if your style guide uses apostrophes for this): “Our SOPs haven’t been updated since the ’90s.” (Note how “SOPs” is plural but there is no apostrophe. Remember, you should never use an apostrophe to indicate a plural, even with acronyms—if you don’t use one when the acronym is spelled out, don’t use one when it’s just the acronym.)
“Curly” vs. “Straight”
Curly, or “smart,” apostrophes should be used for all formal writing because they are easier to read, help the reader differentiate between them and quotation marks, and look nicer. As we noted in the missing letters examples above, the placement of the mark matters: see how the opening quotation marks curl toward what’s inside them, and how the apostrophe curls away from the word it’s attached to? In a contraction, the apostrophe will curl toward the first part of the word; with missing letters, it will curl away, as if it’s “scooping out” the unneeded letter. Now you can look for one of the differences between correct usage and a typo!
It can be confusing to know when apostrophes need to be included and when an apostrophe’s placement is in error, but the professional editors at PAI Consulting are here to help every apostrophe find its home!
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