The apostrophe is a curious mark of punctuation. Reading blogs, websites, or even the Escapist's own pages, one might notice that its usage is, at best, inconsistent, and most likely completely fucking schizophrenic.
Take heart. It's not a difficult symbol to master. All it does is replace other letters in a word. If you[a]'re taking out some letters, use an apostrophe. If not, don[o]'t.
Some among you may ask questions akin to, 'but what about the posessive?' This is a reasonable question, and you should feel no shame for asking it. Those of you who attended public school may, however, wish to pick a bone or two with the(miserable, incompetent) overworked and underpaid teachers who attempted to supply you with a grammatical framework for the English language. The possessive, simply, implies a curtailing of the word "his." As women weren[o]'t allowed to control property until the modern era (like 1980 when Sigourney Weaver played Ripley in Alien, inaugurating modern feminism), formal(outmoded) English retains all possessive contractions as masculine. So even if you wish to borrow a bicycle which belongs to Jane, you're borrowing Jane[hi]'s bike, and not Jane[he]'r bike, which would be obviously wrong and probably also degrade the moral fabric of Yank/Limey/Aussie/Canuck society.
I hope that I have permanently changed the way you view grammar, and that you will now use apostrophes proudly and properly.
I realize this is a vain hope, but I hope it nonetheless.
Take heart. It's not a difficult symbol to master. All it does is replace other letters in a word. If you[a]'re taking out some letters, use an apostrophe. If not, don[o]'t.
Some among you may ask questions akin to, 'but what about the posessive?' This is a reasonable question, and you should feel no shame for asking it. Those of you who attended public school may, however, wish to pick a bone or two with the(miserable, incompetent) overworked and underpaid teachers who attempted to supply you with a grammatical framework for the English language. The possessive, simply, implies a curtailing of the word "his." As women weren[o]'t allowed to control property until the modern era (like 1980 when Sigourney Weaver played Ripley in Alien, inaugurating modern feminism), formal(outmoded) English retains all possessive contractions as masculine. So even if you wish to borrow a bicycle which belongs to Jane, you're borrowing Jane[hi]'s bike, and not Jane[he]'r bike, which would be obviously wrong and probably also degrade the moral fabric of Yank/Limey/Aussie/Canuck society.
I hope that I have permanently changed the way you view grammar, and that you will now use apostrophes proudly and properly.
I realize this is a vain hope, but I hope it nonetheless.
