Many funky uses of the apostrophe

Like a lover you come to know expertly over time, we have now come to know the apostrophe intimately. We have seen it from many different angles and in many different lights. We’ve looked at the rule of Its and It’s, and the rule of indicating possessives, but there are still a few uses of the apostrophe that we haven’t explored.

But first, let’s get reacquainted with some old friends. In 2002, the Australian show Popstars manufactured a pop group called Scandal’us. Here they are, touching each other in a suggestive way. A year earlier, the UK version of the same show produced a band called Hear’Say.

Band names like this say a lot about how little we understand apostrophes. The apostrophe has a group of vital functions in grammar and language. If it was a person, it would be the head of a laboratory that was researching climate change, or an award- winning journalist who had been reporting on government corruption. It would be an important person, but a very serious one. It definitely would not be happy to be thrown into a dodgy pop group’s name by their manager as some sort of pretend rebellion against society.

MC Grammar believes that it’s no coincidence that both these bands had disrespect for the apostrophe, and that they both broke up within a year of winning the Popstars competition. Sadly, at least one of these people now sleeps with Kyle Sandilands, and MC Grammar thinks that in a way, that’s also karmic retribution for mistreating the apostrophe. Don’t let that happen to you. Follow the simple rules for using apostrophes.

1. It indicates time or quantity.

In one week’s time

Or, if the amount of time or quantity is plural:

Two weeks’ notice


Four metres’ worth of rope


2. It indicates the omission if figures in dates

It was the summer of ‘69

3. It indicates the omission of letters

I come from Jo’burg.


I hadn’t thought of that.

She should’ve thrown this out.


Where is the cat-o’-nine-tails?

Bear in mind that there are lots of words that are shortenings of other words, but have become so common in their own right that it’s not necessary to use an apostrophe to indicate the part that’s been left off. For example, phone is a shortening of telephone, and fridge is a shortening of refrigerator, but this is an example where the punctuation isn’t needed because the meaning doesn’t get lost without it.

4. It features in Irish names such as O’Reilly and O’Malley.

5. It indicates the plurals of letters,

Such as: How many t’s are there in attachment?


The apostrophe can also be sometimes be used to indicated non-standard English, like in ‘Lady Chatterley’s Lover’ when the gamekeeper speaks vernacular English, while Lady Chatterley doesn’t. For example, he says,

If yer want ter be ‘ere, yo’ll non want me messin’ abaht a’ th’ time

But this isn’t a hard and fast rule. Just do what your heart tells you.

Knocking on the door of apostrophe-land: 'It's' and 'Its'

MC Grammar likes to keep up to date with technology. You might think that this means that naturally MC Grammar has a Facebook and Twitter account, which he can access directly from his iphone. You’d be close, but wrong. In fact. MC Grammar has decided to speed right on ahead to the next stage of keeping up-to-date and in contact with friends: by simply having a microchip inserted directly into his neck so that his every move can be followed by anyone who wants to keep tabs on him.

But the microchip has had an interesting side-effect: MC Grammar can now read minds. At first it just started as an intercepting the mass currents of status updates, but eventually refined itself so that I can hear just one, concise psychic thought at a time, and from any direction I want. It’s pretty wack.

With all that in mind, I know what you’re thinking right now. I can hear it loud and clear. You’re thinking ‘apostrophes don’t matter. People know what I’m saying anyway.’

As I said in the start of this blog, yeah, your friends on Facebook might know what you're saying, but what about everyone else? If you get lost in the apostrophe wilderness, it can mean instant humiliation among anyone you're trying to impress or persuade on paper. Strange as it may sound, that tiny little tadpole shaped sign does matter.

For example, imagine a newspaper's placard saying 'FAN'S RAGE AT STADIUM CONDITIONS'. This sounds pretty interesting until you realise they meant to say FANS', as in many fans, instead of just one fan who has completely gone mental.


The apostrophe has a lot of uses. The two main ones are:

1. To show that one or more letters have been missed out

Such as:

will not – won’t

do not – don’t

they are – they’re

it is – it’s

2. To show possession

Jane’s daffodils

Edward’s racial prejudice

Slough’s twin city in France

There will be more on apostrophes later on right now we need to deal with a law-breaker.

That’s right, there’s one word that breaks the mutherfucking rules for no obvious reason except to fuck you up, because it’s tough out there on the grammar streets. However bizarre this rule seems, there’s something to remember: there is a reason for this grammatical trickery.

The exception to the rules is the use of It’s and Its.

Use it’s only when you mean It is. For everything else, including when you are referring to something it owns, always use its.

As Lynne Truss says, ‘the rule is: the word it’s (with apostrophe) stands for it is or it has If the word does not stand for it is or it has then what you require is its.

So let’s just imagine you see a baby and you don’t know its gender and don’t care to find out. The way you would write about it is:

Its face reminded me of a wookie

Or, if you were a food critic and you were writing a review, you would say:

This was jellied eel at its best.

However, if you were just saying something ‘It is your turn’, you would just say:

It’s your turn.


The best way to remember this is by using the same system as if you were deciding on whether to use ‘your’ or ‘you’re’. If you’re saying It is, use it’s. If it’s anything else, use its.

Let’s turn to an aural aid. This week we need look no further than one of MC Hammer’s favourites, The Weather Girls, with their track, It’s Raining Men. This song wipes the floor with the newer Geri Halliwell version. Notice how the person who posted this video got it wrong and titled it 'Its Raining Men.' Remember, what they mean is It IS Raining Men, and that’s why it should read It's Raining Men. If it was anything else there would be no apostrophe. Freakishly easy, isn’t it?