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That's and This'
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That's and This' |
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Essorant Member Elite
since 2002-08-10
Posts 4769Regina, Saskatchewan; Canada |
How come people almost never use a possessive s on the words that and this as pronouns? For example: That's owner and this' owner. Although it sounds strange because we are so unfamiliar with it, I think it is a grammatically sound manner. |
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Ron
Administrator
Member Rara Avis
since 1999-05-19
Posts 8669Michigan, US |
It's = contraction of "it is" Its = possessive That's = contraction of "that is" Thats = would have to be the possessive form The rule is to never use an apostrophe to form a possessive pronoun. Otherwise, you'd end up with amalgamations like her's and hi's.  |
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Essorant Member Elite
since 2002-08-10
Posts 4769Regina, Saskatchewan; Canada |
You are right. That is a good correction. |
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ilsm Member
since 2008-04-13
Posts 61UK |
I think the answer is, neither "that" nor "this" have possessive case forms. |
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Essorant Member Elite
since 2002-08-10
Posts 4769Regina, Saskatchewan; Canada |
No they don't, but they originally did. That (þæt) was originally just a neuter form of a the-word meaning "that or the". The genitive/possessive forms for the word were þæs in masculine and neuter, and þære in the feminine, and þara in the plural (for all genders). The forms for the word this in the same cases were þisses, þisse, and þissa. The word it doesn't have a different "form" either, but we just add a genitive ending s to it making it its. Originally, though it did have a different form that was exactly the same as the genitive/possessive for he, that is, his! The form his was normally used throughout premodern English for "its". |
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ilsm Member
since 2008-04-13
Posts 61UK |
How the language has changed over time. Words and word forms that were useful once have disappeared. Grammatical gender has almost disappeared, case endings for nouns also. Verb endings have also changed over time. I don't know how much improvement these changes are reckoned to have made, but I do know that it'd be hard work to understand someone from the Dark Ages now. There's a suggestion (I don't know how reliable it is) that the possessive form will die out entirely eventually, and we will use the preposition "of" instead, in much the same way as the French use "de". If that's the case, to revive the genitive form of an archaic word would not last long. I don't object to those words being given a possessive form, and you do hear children and even adults using "thats" (of that) sometimes. I don't recall hearing "thises" - or maybe "thes"(of this), however. But, if you are arguing in favour of a possessive for "this" and "that", what about other similar words that want a possessive form. I can think of "some" as an example. And I note the comment that pronouns in the possessive take an "s" without an apostrophe. Who can explain why "one" in the possessive is "one's"? |
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