Originally Posted By jonvn I wish there was an edit feature! Active: The boy hit the ball. Passive: The ball was hit by the boy
Originally Posted By jonvn OK, this is the active voice of the sentence I messed up: We removed her leggings with acetone. That works. I think.
Originally Posted By alexbook >>Also, you'd put an apostrophe after the "s" in sun-n-fun's example of a last name ending with s. If you were discussing Indiana Jones nearly losing his hat, you would write: Just before the ancient temple wall was sealed forever, Indiana Jones' fedora was snatched up by the famous archaeologist.<< "Jones'" implies that the fedora belongs to a group of people named "Jone." The correct usage is "Jones's."
Originally Posted By alexbook >>Kenneth G. Wilson (1923–). The Columbia Guide to Standard American English. 1993. -’s, -s’ The possessive or genitive case in nouns adds apostrophe (’) plus s in the singular, s plus apostrophe in the plural. The pronunciations are not always as distinctive as the spellings: boys, boy’s bike, boys’ bikes; dresses, this dress’s skirt, these dresses’ skirts. Proper nouns already ending in -s vary in spelling and sound of genitives: Mr. Jones’s car (pronounced JONZ or JONZ-iz), the Joneses’ cars (pronounced usually JONZ-iz), and either Yeats’s poem or (rarely) Yeats’ poem (pronounced either YAITS-iz or YAITS). See also APOSTROPHE (2); PERSONAL PRONOUNS.<< <a href="http://www.bartleby.com/68/26/5226.html" target="_blank">http://www.bartleby.com/68/26/ 5226.html</a>
Originally Posted By jonvn OK, yes, that's right! If pronounciation would be awkward with the extra syllable, you only add the apostrophe. Typing these rules in off the top of my head.... OK, now how about that passive voice?
Originally Posted By jonvn No, it's easy. Really. It comes down to how you say "Go get Mr. Jones car." I'd say it like that. Or people could say "Go get Mr. Jones's car," which is not how I would say it.
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan That's right. Now I'm off to shop at a few Toys-R-Usses and Staplesus. But first, i could go for a Starbucksus.
Originally Posted By LVBelle Can I just share my grammar pet peeve? Overuse of quotation marks. The all time worst is at Sam's Town casino here in Vegas. One of their doors is marked: Please "open slowly." It drives me insane! I also caught this one on the way to work the other day- corte de "pelo." In English that would be "hair"cut. Why, people, why?
Originally Posted By Mr X **Forget it. I'm going to learn Japanese. English sucks.** lol. Actually, basic Japanese is quite easy because the rules are hard and fast and there are almost NO variations on pronounciation and grammar rules. Very different from English. HOWEVER, then you get into the subtleties of manners and status...it becomes very complicated very quickly to speak "correctly" in every situation. Not to mention the writing. Forget it! English is WAY easier overall.
Originally Posted By Mr X **Please "open slowly." It drives me insane!** That's funny. I can see why it drives you nuts!
Originally Posted By Liberty Belle I can see why the "open slowly" drives you insane, too. My "cousin" writes us "letters" for occasions like "Christmas" and "birthdays" and puts every few "words" in "quotation marks" for no apparent "reason". It's incredibly annoying! My friends call me "Grammar Girl". My particular point of contention is the apostrophe. I, too, have a surname ending in S, and people constantly put " 's" after it (like Jones's). Drives me nuts.
Originally Posted By christiemarsh88 I hate the misuse of colons. "I went to the store to get: bananas, apples, and grapes." Gah! That drives me nuts.
Originally Posted By Lady Starlight <I hate the misuse of colons.> ^ *giggles* Not even going to comment.
