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Anonymous Posted 14 years ago
Grammar
Collective nouns and possession
When speaking in plurals, is it correct to pluralize the collective noun if the possession is already plural?
e.g.
I need help dealing with these customers' complaints.
or would the S at the end of complaints and the use of THESE instead of THE imply that there is more than 1 customer.
e.g.
I need help dealing with these customer's complaints.
or would both be grammatically incorrect?
e.g.
I need help dealing with the complaints of these customers.
And what do you do when you cant pluralize the possession?
e.g.
Collect the wool from those farmers' sheep.
Collect the wool from those farmer's sheep.
Collect the wool off the sheep of those farmers.
I have a feeling that in the instance of collective possession, a simple apostraphe will not make the sentence correct. As in my third example, I feel the sentence needs to be rearranged to show the pluralization of both the possession and the ownership.
I have a few more examples as this debate has gotten a few people i know involved
please comment and let me know which you think are correct and why.
The farmer's wives were tired. ( 1 farmer, multiple wives.)
Those farmer's wives were tired. (multiple farmers, multiple wives.)
The farmers' wives were tired. (multiple farmers, multiple wives.)
The farmer's sheep are missing. (1 farmer, multiple sheep.)
The farmers' sheep are missing. (multiple farmers, multiple sheep.)
Those farmer's sheep are missing. (multiple farmers, multiple sheep.)
It could very well be that all of those sentences are grammatically incorrect, as I said, in most of those instances, confusion would be saved by simply rearranging the sentence.
e.g.
The wives and sheep of all the farmers are missing and must be very tired. (multiple sheep, multiple wives, multiple farmers.)
e.g.
I need help dealing with these customers' complaints.
or would the S at the end of complaints and the use of THESE instead of THE imply that there is more than 1 customer.
e.g.
I need help dealing with these customer's complaints.
or would both be grammatically incorrect?
e.g.
I need help dealing with the complaints of these customers.
And what do you do when you cant pluralize the possession?
e.g.
Collect the wool from those farmers' sheep.
Collect the wool from those farmer's sheep.
Collect the wool off the sheep of those farmers.
I have a feeling that in the instance of collective possession, a simple apostraphe will not make the sentence correct. As in my third example, I feel the sentence needs to be rearranged to show the pluralization of both the possession and the ownership.
I have a few more examples as this debate has gotten a few people i know involved
please comment and let me know which you think are correct and why.The farmer's wives were tired. ( 1 farmer, multiple wives.)
Those farmer's wives were tired. (multiple farmers, multiple wives.)
The farmers' wives were tired. (multiple farmers, multiple wives.)
The farmer's sheep are missing. (1 farmer, multiple sheep.)
The farmers' sheep are missing. (multiple farmers, multiple sheep.)
Those farmer's sheep are missing. (multiple farmers, multiple sheep.)
It could very well be that all of those sentences are grammatically incorrect, as I said, in most of those instances, confusion would be saved by simply rearranging the sentence.
e.g.
The wives and sheep of all the farmers are missing and must be very tired. (multiple sheep, multiple wives, multiple farmers.)
Top answer
or would the S at the end of complaints and the use of THESE instead of THE imply that there is more than 1 customer. Neither customer nor complaint is a collective noun. You must mean something else.
- or would the S at the end of complaints and the use of THESE instead of THE imply that there is more than 1 customer.
- Neither customer nor complaint is a collective noun.
- You must mean something else.
- In any case, the following is the correct way to write it.
- I need help dealing with these customers' complaints.
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3 Answers
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AnonymousWhen speaking in plurals, is it correct to pluralize the collective noun if the possession is already plural?e.g.I need help dealing with these customers' complaints.or would the S at the end of complaints and the use of THESE instead of THE imply that there is more than 1 customer.Neither customer nor complaint is a collective noun. Y
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Should "customers' " be changed to an attributive noun? Customer complaints. Why does that sound right when compared to customers' complaints? And how come it works with stuff like "Farmer Problems" but not stuff like "Farmer Wives"
When someone says "customer complaints" to me, I don't imagine 1 customer.
But if someone said "customers' complaints" to me, I would think they didn't k
When someone says "customer complaints" to me, I don't imagine 1 customer.
But if someone said "customers' complaints" to me, I would think they didn't k
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AnonymousShould "customers' " be changed to an attributive noun? Customer complaints.You need not do that. No.
But it's not wrong.
I need help dealing with these customers' complaints. these goes with customers'.
I need help dealing with these customer complaints. these goes with complaints
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