Possession of things

Question

Hi!I've found on more places the computer's expression. I know that 's is used for a possession, and it is always used for persons, but when is used for things?Thanks in advance!

Mr Wordy · Accepted Answer

It has fundamentally the same meaning for both people and things: the sense of "belonging to".

"John's house" -- the house belonging to John

"My friend's pen" -- the pen belonging to my friend

In the case of inanimate objects, the sense is often more naturally expressed by "of", but the fundamental idea of some sort of abstract "possession" is the same:

"The computer's memory" -- the memory of ("belonging to") the computer

"The sun's rays" -- the rays of ("belonging to") the sun

Attributive nouns (one noun modifying another in the manner of an adjective) are often used as an alternative to possessive "s". For example, "house prices" means "the prices of houses" so you might think it could (or should) be written "houses' prices". In fact, no one would ever say that.* There are lots of similar examples. I'm not sure whether there is any easy rule that explains which uses of possessive "s" seem natural and which don't

BTW, I don't understand your first sentence.

*Edit: I should know better by now than to say "never". Actually, it's conceivable that you might say this if talking about the prices of some specific houses. However, you wouldn't say it about the prices of houses in general.

Damir · Answer

What I ment on my first sentence is that I've found on several places the expression "computer's".

So there are no rules for that but to learn every single expression.

I know that it's the same meaning as for people, but I don't know when to apply a certain rule. Why is it "computer's memory" and not "computer memory" or "memory of the computer"?! I think that the most common rule is to use atributive nouns (?). I've already asked on the forum and my teacher about the "of" possession and heard that its usage is complicated, actually that there are no rules for it, and that they have to be memorized.

Thank you Mr Wordy!

Mr Wordy · Answer

I think "usage is complicated" is exactly right. I'm not sure it's true that you have to learn every expression individually, because I believe that native speakers put together novel combinations (combinations that they've never seen or heard before) in a style that "seems right". But if you asked the average native speaker to explain exactly how they do this then I think most would struggle.

In fact, "computer's memory", "computer memory" and "memory of the computer" are all possible. I would often use "computer memory" in an uncountable sense (e.g. "Computer memory has halved in price in the past five years"). If talking about the memory of a specific computer I'd often say "(the) computer's memory" (or less commonly "the memory of the computer").

This pattern seems apply to various other cases where the second noun can be used in an uncountable sense. For example, "I don't like restaurant food" (general) vs. "I don't like this restaurant's food" (specific). But in this case, "I don't like the food of this restaurant" doesn't feel very natural to me (and yet "I don't like the location of this restaurant" seems fine).

It seems to me that attributive nouns are often preferred over apostrophe "s" when the two things commonly go together. For example, I would normally say "the car door" (not "the car's door") and "the window frame" (not "the window's frame"). On the other hand, I would usually say "the car's carburettor" (not "the car carburettor"), presumably because this is a less familiar combination.

Damir · Answer

I believe it's complicated. English language has so many rules and even more exceptions. You don't need to learn every single expression individually because you're a native speaker. You differ what's wrong and what's right by hearing it, you know it sounds right. I can't do it that way. I'm speaking by rules which I've learned, and only sometimes can depend on my hearing (what sounds right).

My language (Croatian) is similar to German, and every word has something like German language has, der, die and das. It must be learned what goes before every noun. I (and every Croatian native speaker) don't need to learn them anymore (for our language), and I can define which *** (??? i think it's that called) the unknown noun is.

Back to subject. Is it always the case (or mostly) to use atributive nouns when it's regarding to something general, 's if it's regarding to something specific, and if the two things commonly go together to use atributive nouns? (I know that there must be some exceptions).

You're so much of a help Mr Wordy. I like your explanations and I see you're really trying to explain it to me as much as you can. Thank you very much!

Mr Wordy · Answer

DamirIs it always the case (or mostly) to use atributive nouns when it's regarding to something general, 's if it's regarding to something specific

There do seem to be many examples where there is this tendency. Apart from the ones already mentioned, some that randomly come to mind are:

"There is too much government legislation" -- general

"This government's legislation is flawed" -- specific

"Star formation takes place in dense clouds of gas" -- general

"A million years after the star's formation, ..." -- specific

"My sofa is covered in cat hair" -- general

"My cat's hair is falling out" -- specific

Counterexamples that come to mind are "cows' milk" and "men's fashion" (you would not, even in a general sense, say "cow milk" or "man fashion"). As it happens, these are both animate nouns (but this isn't a foolproof rule either, as the "cat hair" example shows).

Bear in mind also that attributive nouns are used in many other cases where 's isn't possible (or means something different) because the sense is not sufficiently strongly that of "of" or "belonging to". For example: "time travel", "emergency rations", "safety device". (It's actually quite difficult in some attributive cases to to decide whether the 's version sounds wrong because there isn't a true sense of "belonging to" or for some other reason.)

Damir and if the two things commonly go together to use atributive nouns?

Again, there seem to be plenty of examples:

"tree trunk"

"church spire"

"TV aerial"

"book cover"

"typewriter key"

But again there will inevitably be exceptions. (It's also a somewhat blurry and subjective criterion.) Counterexamples that come to mind are stock phrases -- words that have come to be commonly associated simply through frequent repetition -- such as "pig's ear" and "death's door". I guess "sun's rays" is also a counterexample. There seems no logical reason why we don't say "sun rays", but we usually don't (though there is a compund noun, "sunray", that is occasionally used).

[Edit: But note that in these cases of commonly associated nouns where the attributive use feels very natural, the 's version is not necessarily forbidden (and may even be preferred in some situations). For example, you could say "that book's cover is torn".]

So, I should re-emphasise that these are just tendencies that come to mind after thinking about a few examples. This is one of those areas where one feels it's quite possible that something one hasn't thought of will pop up and scupper things. It's very difficult, even for a native speaker, to arrive at anything even close to a complete categorisation of usage without a great deal of study of all the situations where these constructions might be used.

Possession of things

Top answer

Get the Weekly English Kit 📬

Related Questions