Possesive's

When we want to show that something belongs to somebody or something, we usually add 's to a singular noun and an apostrophe ' to a plural noun, for example:

• the boy's ball (one boy)
• the boys' ball (two or more boys)

Notice that the number of balls does not matter. The structure is influenced by the possessor and not the possessed.

	one ball	more than one ball
one boy	the boy's ball	the boy's balls
more than one boy	the boys' ball	the boys' balls

The structure can be used for a whole phrase:

• the man next door's mother (the mother of the man next door)
• the Prime Minister of Malaysia's cat (the cat of the Prime Minister of Malaysia)

Although we can use of to show possession, it is more usual to use possessive 's. The following phrases have the same meaning, but #2 is more usual and natural:

• the boyfriend of my sister
• my sister's boyfriend

Proper Nouns (Names)

We very often use possessive 's with names:

• This is Anis's car.
• Where is Ram's telephone?
• Who took Markojin's pen?
• I like Zizi's hair.

When a name ends in s, we usually treat it like any other singular noun, and add 's:

• This is Ecot's chair.

But it is possible (especially with older, classical names) to just add the apostrophe ':

• Who was Farizan's father?

Irregular Plurals

Some nouns have irregular plural forms without s (man > men). To show possession, we usually add 's to the plural form of these nouns:

singular noun	plural noun
my child's fish	my children's fish
the man's work	the men's work
the mouse's cage	the mice's cage
a person's clothes	people's clothes