21st Century Grammar Handbook (26 page)

Pronouns form possessives in special ways.
Indefinite
pronouns follow the
rules
below, adding “‘s” in most cases.
Personal pronouns
have unique possessive forms. See the entries for individual pronouns for more details.

Most singular nouns add an
apostrophe
(’) and “s” to form a possessive: “The bird’s beak is long.” In the
plural,
nouns that end in “s” add only an apostrophe: “The birds’ beaks are long.” Plural nouns or
collective nouns
that do not end in “s” add both the apostrophe and “s”: “The children’s outing was Tuesday.” Singular nouns or
names
that end in “s” also add apostrophe and “s” to form the possessive: “Sophocles’s plays were of little interest in Jesus’s time.” Some styles form possessives for important or traditional names that end in “s” with just an apostrophe. Unless you are compelled to follow such a style, add “s.”

When more than two things or people possess something, you need to determine whether each one has an equal and separate share or whether the ownership is combined or
joint. In the first instance, show individual ownership by more than one person or thing by making each word possessive: “Joan’s and John’s book is spellbinding.” For the latter instance, show joint or combined ownership by making only the last person or thing possessive: “Nixon and Agnew’s morals were suspect.”

If you are unsure how shared or distinct contributions to or ownership of something is, then it is probably better to assume separate possessives will be more accurate and not offend anyone by slighting his or her role. This is particularly true for husbands and wives, male-female teams, and parent-child ownerships. It is considered offensive to subsume the wife’s, female’s, or child’s role or ownership under that of the male or elder by putting only one name into the possessive. Be quite sure of your facts if you do write something like “Mr. and Mrs. Smith’s business.” It might well turn out that the Smiths would have preferred to see “Jane Smith’s and John Smith’s business,” which gives them equal billing. See
sexist language.

Precede, proceed.
Commonly confused, these similar words differ in meaning. “Precede” means come before; “proceed” means to continue or move in procession.

Predicate.
Everything in a sentence that is not the
subject
is the “predicate”:
verb, object, predicate adjective
or
noun (subject complement),
and related words. “The door is open to the balcony, which overlooks the shining bay of Naples and the scattered islands that ring the harbor.”

In the example all the words from “is” to the end are parts of the predicate. With
inversion
or other
orders of
words
possible and common in English, predicates don’t always follow subjects: “Is it true that time is up?” The predicate in the main sentence in this example equals everything but
“it”
in the subordinate
clause
beginning with “that,” the predicate equals “is up.”

Besides the simple
agreement
requirements between subject and predicate—that verbs, predicate adjectives and
pronouns,
and subject complements match the subject in
number
and
person
—it is important that subject and predicate match in a more general way. They need to refer to the same thing or same order of thing. WRONG: “The reason I woke up is John made noise.” A reason and a person are not really equivalent or of the same order. BETTER: “The reason I woke up is that John made noise.” A reason can be a
clause
explaining something, as in the example.

Mismatches between sentence elements happen most often with forms of
“be”
the
linking verb
and a common weak spot in sentences. Combining “be” with
“when”
“where,” or
“because”
is another weak writing move and often the sign of a predicate mismatch. WRONG: “Sleep is when it is quiet.” Not really; sleep doesn’t equal a time or condition of silence, though it might happen then. BETTER: “I sleep when it is quiet.” “Sleep comes to me when it is quiet.” “Sleep is best at times of quiet.” There are many more variants that are clearer than the “wrong” example.

Look for linking verbs and other signals in all your
sentences,
and revise with care to ensure that subject and predicate agree and match grammatically and in terms of general sense. See also
phrases
for more explanation of the
parts of speech
that go into subjects and predicates and
revision
and
editing.

Predicate adjective.
Adjectives
that fall in
predicates
are called “predicate adjectives”: “The barn is red.” “Red” is an adjective modifying or referring to “the barn.” Such words are also called
“subject complements.”

Predicate noun.
Nouns
and
pronouns
that appear in
predicates
and are the simple equivalent of the
subject
are called “predicate nouns”: “Jan is a student.” “Student” is a predicate noun in this example. Such words are also called
subject complements.

There is no limit to the length or complexity of
noun phrases
or pronoun
phrases
that can constitute predicate nouns. However, they must agree grammatically and in general with their subjects, sharing
number
and
person
in most cases. Longer and more complex phrases should be checked to make sure that
agreement
has not been lost sight of.

Prefix.
Sets of letters that are added to the beginnings of words to modify their meaning are called “prefixes.” The list that follows includes the most common prefixes and gives a sense of how their addition to a word changes its meaning. Note, however, that the same prefix can have different results with different words. For instance, “re” at the start of a word can indicate something is done again or once more (“revise”) or that the action is directed back to its source or origin (“reveal” or “return”).

Prefixes are usually spelled solid with the word to which they are attached: “recreate.” But when distinctions are possible between meanings of prefixed words that are otherwise spelled the same, a
hyphen
may be inserted:
“recreation means leisure” but “re-creation means creating again.” Similarly, when prefixes are attached to capitalized or
compound words,
hyphens are used: “pre-civil War.” See
capitalization.

Preposition.
Prepositions are words that indicate a relationship between two or more things and/or people but not an action. They specify direction, scope, timing, and other aspects of action or condition by linking a noun to another
noun, verb,
or
adverb.

The most common prepositions are the following:
about, above, across, after, against, along, among,
around,
as, at, below, before, behind, beneath, beside,
between,
beyond, by, down, during,
except,
for, from, in,
inside,
into, like,
near,
of, off, on, onto, out,
outside, over, past,
since, through, toward, under,
until,
up, with, without.

Prepositions and the nouns and other words that they
“govern” make
prepositional phrases
that function as
adjectives
or adverbs. In the following artificial example, the many prepositional phrases play various roles that are explained after the example: “Toward evening, the elephant walked into the clearing and trumpeted to the skies above us its disapproval of our presence in its realm.”

Note that prepositions govern the
objective case,
which means that
pronouns
that are the
objects
of prepositions change form to reflect their
case:
“I gave it to them.” The function of the prepositional phrase in the sentence does not change this
rule
—all objects of prepositions are in the objective case.

Prepositional phrases placed at the beginning of
sentences
can be set off with
commas
in the following circumstances: if they are
nonrestrictive phrases
(contribute less than essential information to the sentence like’ Toward evening’ in the example); if they are long (though just what is long is a matter of judgment); or if not setting them off would confuse the reader (often true when the prepositional phrases are fairly far away from what they modify). Putting prepositional phrases at the beginning of sentences is a useful way to emphasize something or vary
style
to sustain reader interest (see
emphasis).

Like all sentence elements with varying roles and flexible positioning within a sentence, prepositional phrases can be put in the wrong place or in a place that confuses the reader. If, in the example, the phrase “toward evening” appeared as the last words in the sentence, it would be hard to know what was happening at that time or what was being modified by the phrases “our presence” or “its realm” (presuming the elephant had a daytime realm). Check all sentences that have prepositional phrases to see that they are placed and worded so that it is clear what they are referring to (see
clarity).

When prepositions appear in
names
or
titles
that are capitalized, the prepositions should not be capitalized whatever
their length or function, unless they are the first word in the title
(On Golden Pond)
or are the subject themselves of the title in some way (“The Grammar of To”). See
capitalization.

Prepositional phrase.
All the
nouns
or
pronouns
and the words modifying them that are “governed by” a
preposition
(follow it as its
objects)
constitute the prepositional phrase: “That meeting of
executives
was boring. The idea
of them making decisions
is ludicrous.” All the underlined words are the prepositional phrases in these examples.