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Subject:Re: The Death of the Apostrophe From:Brett Peruzzi <Brett -dot- Peruzzi -at- FDC-TSSG -dot- COM> Date:Wed, 15 Nov 1995 09:13:42 -0500
I don't believe the apostrophe will ever leave the English language,
because there are so many people who use it when it is not needed. One of
the more common misuses appears in plural nouns. I once saw a bar in
Jacksonville FL with a facade that promised:
DRINK'S GAME'S SNACK'S
So, while there are many instances where the necessary apostrophe is
omitted, they are at least partially offset by gratuitous ones.
Brett Peruzzi
First Data Investor Services
Speaking for myself only, of course (are there any corporations that
would issue statements on grammar!?)
Has anyone out there read Charles Larson's November 6 essay in Newsweek
about the decline of the apostrophe?
In the essay (ITS ACADEMIC, OR IS IT?) Larson posits that people under the
age of 35 generally have no idea how the apostrophe ought to be used. Ever
since a colleague pointed the article out to me, I've become hyper-aware of
how often the apostrophe is misused today.
Is the apostrophe on the way out of the English language? Should we be
fighting on the front to keep the apostrophe alive or mourning its passing?
