When to use 's

Question

Hi,Would you please tell me why the use of an apostrophe is warranted in the first item below, but not in the second one:1- City's orchestra (i.e. the orchestra of the city)2- Pageant judges (but not pageant's judge, i.e., the judges of the pageant)Thank you

Rover_KE · Accepted Answer

They could both be used with or without an apostrophe.

KrisBlueNZ · Answer

The issue here is not actually the use of an apostrophe, but the use of the whole 'S (apostrophe-ess) suffix.
The 'S suffix indicates possessive, e.g. "John's house" = the house possessed by, or associated with, John.
But there are cases where the whole 'S suffix can be omitted, and one of these is when the noun is a group.
"The board chairman" ~= "The board's chairman"
"The group spokesperson" ~= "The group's spokesperson"
"The city orchestra" ~= "The city's orchestra"
"The pageant judges" ~= "The pageant's judges"
(By the way, ~= means "is roughly equal to".)
Which form is preferred depends mainly on convention, although you can change where the emphasis falls by using a specific form - using the possessive form of the group noun can put more emphasis on the group noun.
In your examples, I would say "The city orchestra" and "The pageant judges", in other words, no 'S suffix for either of them.

When to use 's

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