EXPLANATION Notice that in the example above, the sister owns the surfboard. Whenever we wish to show such ownership, such possession, for one person, we simply add 's to the owner's name.
Examine the phrases below and you will see that they have all been formed in the same way as my sister's surfboard.
- the man's hat
- Olivia's coat
- James's books (yes, add 's even if the noun ends in s)
- Mr Ellis's car
Notice that in each of the examples above, there is only one man, one Olivia, one James, one Mr Ellis: that is, each of the ownership nouns is singular (from the word single). Hence, when making singular words show possession, simply add 's. This is the case even if the singular word ends in s.
The above examples make it easy to understand how we add 's to show possession. Note, however, that 'possession' is not actually about 'ownership' as such. It is about the relationship between two nouns in a grammatical sense. If we say, the cat's bowl, for example, the cat does not 'own' the bowl, but we use the construction as a shorthand for 'the bowl of the cat'. We do the same thing with any number of phrases, where we are showing a grammatical relationship, not actual possession:
- the cyclone's fury
- the boy's teacher
- the baker's pies
- the house's windows
- the coach's strategy
- Beethoven's deafness
Hence, we add 's to show 'possession' for singular words. Why is it then that many people struggle when adding a simple 's? The difficulties stem to a large extent from the fact that some grammar books make exceptions to the rule when longer words end in s. (They say just to add an apostrophe.) However, you will find apostrophes far less confusing if you just add 's consistently to any singular word to indicate possession, no matter whether it ends with an s or not – especially as words of one syllable ending in s or the s sound MUST be followed by ’s to show possession: e.g. Russ’s, Bruce’s, Jess’s, nurse’s.