Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- adjective Of or relating to ownership or possession.
- adjective Having or manifesting a desire to control or dominate another, especially in order to limit that person's relationships with others.
- adjective Grammar Of, relating to, or being a noun or pronoun case that indicates possession.
- noun The possessive case.
- noun A possessive form or construction.
from The Century Dictionary.
- Pertaining to or denoting possession; expressing possession: as in a lady's dress, their house, a mere notion of John's.
- noun A pronoun or other word denoting possession.
- noun The possessive case.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- adjective Of or pertaining to possession; having or indicating possession.
- adjective (Eng. Gram.) the genitive case; the case of nouns and pronouns which expresses ownership, origin, or some possessive relation of one thing to another; as,
Homer's admirers; thepear's flavor; thedog's faithfulness. - adjective a pronoun denoting ownership; as,
his name;her home;my book. - noun (Gram.) The possessive case.
- noun (Gram.) A possessive pronoun, or a word in the possessive case.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- adjective Of or pertaining to
ownership orpossession . - adjective grammar Indicating
ownership ,possession ,origin , etc. - adjective Unwilling to yield possession of.
- noun grammar The
possessive case . - noun grammar A word used to indicate the possessive case.
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun the case expressing ownership
- adjective having or showing a desire to control or dominate
- adjective serving to express or indicate possession
- adjective desirous of owning
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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To make the word possessive, you add an apostrophe and an "s" (rope's).
Arianna Huffington: Arianna's Grammar Pet Peeve: The Apostrophe Crisis 2010
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Even if the “ugly spirits,” as he called the possessive forces, could not be exorcised, they could be kept under control, he discovered, through the process of writing about them.
The Typewriter Is Holy Bill Morgan 2010
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Even if the “ugly spirits,” as he called the possessive forces, could not be exorcised, they could be kept under control, he discovered, through the process of writing about them.
The Typewriter Is Holy Bill Morgan 2010
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In his book, Halpern deals with one such case of Barzun's being criticized by Pinker, in which Pinker says that Barzun "earned an 'F'" because he called the possessive use of a noun an adjective.
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If you used the shortened form, you'd just say "in-laws' house", but since you're using the full form, it's correct to pluralise the noun and not the modifier ('parents' rather than 'in law'), and then make the entire term possessive, because it's acting as a noun cluster. ("parents-in-law's")
The Skinny Kitten Story (In Which I Am Both A Liar And A Kitten Thief) 2008
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This is a good point at which to explain possessive plurals, as we have already added an “s”, we can now simply add an apostrophe; “the scrotes’ lawyer” (the lawyer for several scrotes).
Cross & Rude « POLICE INSPECTOR BLOG Inspector Gadget 2009
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For Kilpatrick, the friend of … part of the phrase establishes possession, and thus the ‘s possessive is redundant.
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For Kilpatrick, the friend of … part of the phrase establishes possession, and thus the ‘s possessive is redundant.
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Oh, wait…what’s that marginalization term possessive individualists use…statist?
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As the possessive is the only case of nouns that has a distinctive inflection, it is only with this case that mistakes can occur in construction.
Higher Lessons in English A work on english grammar and composition Brainerd Kellogg
born2badored commented on the word possessive
to want all to ones self. selfish and greedy
December 6, 2006
bilby commented on the word possessive
Or not.
November 20, 2009