5th Module

 

Possessive adjectives

They are used to indicate who owns the subject or object of the sentence. They are followed by a noun (or a noun clause).

As can be seen, they are much less than in Spanish, since they do not differ in singular or plural. However, you should pay attention when they refer to the third person, since in Spanish "su" is used in all cases, while in English they vary depending on the person.

Possessives: nouns

We add 's to singular nouns to show possession:

We are having a party at John's house.

Michael drove his friend's car.

We add ' to plural nouns ending in -s:

This is my parents' house.

Those are ladies' shoes.

But we use 's with irregular plural nouns: 

• men
• women
• children
• people

These are men's shoes.

Children's clothes are very expensive.

We can use a possessive instead of a full noun phrase to avoid repeating words:

Is that John's car?

     No, it's Mary's. (NOT No, it's Mary's [car].)

Whose coat is this?

     It's my wife's. (NOT It's my wife's [coat].)

It's time to put possessives into practice in this activity:

Activity 5