The aberrant apostrophe

I'm going to start with this because it will help explain many other errors. It's also known as the grocer's apostrophe because you can still find signs at greengrocers saying things like:

Potato's
£1.45/lb

Apple's
£1.20 for 4.

I hope one or two grocers are reading this 😊

Apostrophes are used for only two reasons – to show possession and contraction.

Apostrophes used for possession

If an object belongs to a person or another object, we use an apostrophe. Eg:

Bob's house
Kathy's car
The dog's bone
Chris's bedroom

Even if the noun (the thing that 'possesses' the object) ends with an s, you still add an apostrophe s ('s) to indicate possession.

It is also correct to omit the final s if the noun already ends in an s:

Chris' bedroom
Bess' dress' bow

This is usually downs to the house style of the publisher or magazine. Omitting the final s is perhaps a little more modern and neat. Use whichever you like but be consistent.

However, Chri's bedroom is not correct and doesn't make sense. What that actually says is "the bedroom belonging to Chri". Yes...

So you can see why the grocer's apostrophe is incorrect. In the first place, presumably the grocer has more than one potato and the plural of potato is potatoes, not potato's. In the seond place, the price does not belong to the potatoes. In neither case should be an apostrophe,

Apostrophes used for contraction

The second use of the apostrophe is to show when two words have been squeezed together and some letters removed as a result. Eg:

Didn't Did not
Don't Do not
They've They have
I'll I will
We're We are
You'd You would
It's It is or it has

There is one exception to this:

Won't Will not

Hopefully, that is clear.

Next we'll look at what is possibly the most common English language error of all!