Do you ever wonder, as you’re writing your term paper, whether to say “Clark’s and Sacagawea’s mooseskins” or “Clark and Sacagawea’s mooseskins”? Maybe you don’t, but this is a question of shared and separate possessives, and knowing how to punctuate your sentence so it says what you want to say is very useful. Here are some handy examples that will explain shared and separate possessives:
(1) Emma disected the pig with Jeff and Vicki’s daggers.
(2) Emma disected the pig with Jeff’s and Vicki’s daggers.
(3) Emma disected the pig with Jeff and Vicki’s dagger.
(4) Emma disected the pig with Jeff’s and Vicki’s dagger.
In 1, Emma disected the pig using multiple daggers which were all owned by Jeff and Vicki. In 2, Emma used some daggers that were Vicki’s and some daggers that were Jeff’s. In 3, Emma used a single dagger owned by both Jeff and Vicki. Even though the sentences only vary by an apostrophe “s” here and there, you can see that this makes a big difference in what the sentences mean. Any of these three options work, depending on whose daggers Emma was using and how many.
Number 4 does not work because there is only one dagger and the punctuation tells us that it is only Jeff’s and only Vicki’s, and since this is clearly impossible, the sentence is punctuated incorrectly.
Filed under: Grammar Help, Uncategorized
