When Is A Noun Possessive:How,Why And 7 Facts You Should Know

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When is a noun possessive?We often hear this question . A noun can sometimes be transformed into a possessive noun. We will go through the contexts in which a noun can be a possessive noun and we will learn some facts related to it.

 A noun is a possessive noun when it is owns  something.It shows belonging or possession.

    We have simple ways to show when a noun is possessive.There comes the use of an apostrophe(‘) .We use an apostrophe and an ‘s’ at the end of the noun which owns a thing.

If it is a singular possessive noun we use ‘s (we call it simply apostrophe s) with the noun and if it is plural possessive noun we use an apostrophe after the s (s’).Possessive nouns can be singular and plural.

Singular possessive noun: here the noun we talk about is singular.For example.

1.John’s pen is black

Here john is the name and pen is the thing he owns.So in order to show that the pen belongs to john we added an apostrophe and an s (‘s) to the noun john.

Johns’s is a singular possessive noun.

2.Sara’s dog is a ferocious one.

 Here it is clear that Sara has a dog .So ,we have to make the noun Sara possessive. For that, we can add an apostrophe and an s after the name Sara.

Plural possessive noun:here the noun we talk about is plural.

Plural nouns can be transformed into possessive nouns as well.In order to show that a plural noun is possessive ,if the plural noun ends with the letter s ,we add an apostrophe to the s. If there is no s at the end of the a  plural noun, we can simply add an apostrophe and an s at the end of that noun. For example.

1.Girls’ hostel is near the college.

Here the hostel is the one where the girls reside .So the plural name girls has to be transformed into a possessive noun. We can make girls a possessive noun by adding an apostrophe to the last letter s .There is no need to add an extra ‘s’ after the apostrophe.

2.Children’s park.

Here the park belongs to children.So the noun children should be a possessive noun.We can add an apostrophe and an s to the noun children to make it a possessive noun.

1.Can a noun be possessive?

Yes, a noun can be possessive  .

A noun becomes possessive when it has to show a relationship such as ownership, possession, characteristic, etc.

Car is a noun. But it can be a   possessive  noun when we say,

Car’s colour is blue.

Plants is a noun. But when we say ,

Plants’ seeds

In the above sentence it is a possessive noun.

2.How is a noun possessive?

   A noun is a possessive when we add some attributes  like ownership, possession, etc to the noun.

  For example

1.Tony’s mother is a loving lady.

Here the mother belongs to Tony .So tony became a possessive noun.

2.The flamingo’s wings helps it to fly.

Here we talked about flamingo’s characteristic ,its wings. Thus flamingo became a possessive noun.

3.How to use possessive noun?

 There are different ways to use a possessive noun depending on the subject.The subject can be plural or singular noun.

  If it is a singular noun, we can add an apostrophe and  an ‘s’ to that noun. For example: Tomy’s sister.

If it is a plural noun which ends with the letter ‘s’ ,then we can add just an apostrophe after the ‘s’. There is no need to add an extra ‘s’ after the apostrophe .For example:

1.Boys’ hostel is in the suburbs.

If the plural noun does not end with an ‘s’ ,then we can add an apostrophe and an ‘s’ at the end of the noun. For example:

2.Women’s room is in the left corner.

If it is a compound word which talks about a common possession ,you need to add apostrophe and an ‘s’s at the end of the second noun.For example:

3.Ravi and Anu’s mother.

4.When to use possessive noun?

 If we want to convey that a thing or a person owns something, we can use a possessive noun. We can use a possessive noun when we say that something belongs to that noun.

For example.

1.Anna’s house is in the suburbs.

2.Her car’s number is easy to remember.

So usage of possessive noun helps us to make sentences more simple.

5.Where to use possessive noun?

  If we need to show that something particular belongs to a person or a thing we can use possessive noun.

  If we want to rewrite the sentence ‘the feathers of the bird’ we can rewrite it as :

The bird’s feathers

Another example is ‘Mother of Sam is very caring’ can be written as:

Sam’s mother is very caring .

Possessive noun is used in front of the item it possesses.

6.Why to use possessive noun ? 

   We use possessive nouns so that we can denote a possession or an  attribute of something in simple sentence.

‘The blue colour of the car’ can be formed into a simple  sentence by rewriting it as :

The car’s blue colour

Children’s park is working efficiently

The above sentence is simple than ‘the park of children is working efficiently’.

7.Double possessive.

When we use the preposition ‘of’ and the apostrophe s together in a sentence we call it double possessive.

For example:

Friend of my brother’s

      A dress of my friend’s.

 Conclusion:

Thus from the above discussion we have learned about the contexts when a noun can be a possessive. The rules mentioned in the article made it clear when , where and how to use a possessive noun. We use an apostrophe and an s to make a noun possessive .