pluralization vs. possession.

this one is a bit long (because i inserted some explanations), but well worth reading...

once i got into an argument over pluralization. you know, when you have more than one thing but they're called by the same name? my former roommate and i were making a sign for her brothers, who rodeo (please reserve judgment). i can't remember exactly what she wanted the sign to say because we ended up changing it because of the argument which i will tell you about forthrightly.

so the roommate's decision (at least, this is what i think it was) was to write this on the sign: "we love (or a heart in place of the word love) the munns's". do you get it? munns is their last name and there are two of them. right? i didn't think so. i said that when you write it like that, it indicates ownership. like, "the munns' house" or "the munns' cattle ranch" (make note that in my mind, i saw munns' rather than munns's). she was adamant that i was wrong. because she has had that name her whole life and has always said "munns's". i was adamant that i was right. you know, because i usually AM at stuff like this. so, in comes rachelle.

rachelle is siding with sara and is telling me that i am too stubborn about stuff like this. that i cannot accept that there is a possibility that i am wrong. rachelle and i (being the naturally curious people we are) start making phone calls to our most intelligent of friends to help us get an answer (let it be known that we had no internet access at that house, so we had to rely on the phone for this one). i, of course, called my bff emily because she is probably the smartest person i know. first, she immediately sides with me. wooohooo! then she tells me she will do some internet research and get back to me.

in the meantime, we continue to make our other two signs, one for each brother. they do not have names which need to be pluralized. nor do we need to indicate any sort of possession with their signs. easy. and no arguments. we continue to discuss the possibility of my being incorrect.

my phone rings. it is emily. with the answer! hallelujah!
guess who was right?

Plurals.
Plural means "more than one." English handles these things more simply than many languages. You already know the basic rules: most nouns take an s or es at the end; singular nouns ending in y usually end in ies in the plural. Our adjectives don't change form at all. There are a handful of irregular nouns — child, children; woman, women — but native speakers learn the important ones early, and non-native speakers can find a list of them easily enough.

A few exceptions require special care. In some noun phrases, the "head noun" gets the plural, even if it's not at the end of the noun phrase: mothers in law, attorneys general, courts martial. (Such forms may be disappearing, but they're still preferred.)

Many people get spooked by the plurals of proper names: the rules really aren't that different. Papa Smith, Mama Smith, and Baby Smith are the Smiths; Mr. Birch, Mrs. Birch, and Junior Birch are the Birches. The only difference is that proper names ending in y shouldn't change form in the plural: just add an s. The members of the Percy family are the Percys, not the Percies.

Resist the urge to put an apostrophe before the s in a plural, whether in common or proper nouns. The term for this vulgar error is the "greengrocer's apostrophe," from the shopkeepers' habit of advertising their "potato's" and "apple's." The only occasions on which you use apostrophes to make plurals are spelled out in my entry for apostrophes. [Entry added 14 Sept. 2004.]

Possessive.
The possessive is used to indicate belonging: Carol's car ("the car that belongs to Carol"), my brother's apartment ("the apartment that belongs to my brother"), my neighbors' yard ("the yard that belongs to my neighbors"), his name ("the name that belongs to him"), and so on. You could also express most of them with of: "the car of Carol," "the apartment of my brother," "the yard of my neighbors," "the name of him."

The rules for forming possessives are simple:

The personal pronouns have their own possessive forms: my ("belonging to me"), your ("belonging to you"), his ("belonging to him"), her ("belonging to her"), our ("belonging to us"), and their ("belonging to them").
With most singular nouns, you form the possessive with an apostrophe and s: Carol's, brother's.
With plural nouns ending in s, just add an apostrophe: neighbors'. Personal names don't get treated any differently: Bush's agenda ("the agenda that belongs to Bush"), the Smiths' house ("the house that belongs to the Smiths").
Plural nouns that don't end in s are treated like singular nouns, with apostrophe and s: the people's choice, the children's toys, and so on.
The only time for hesitation is when you have a singular noun that ends in s or an s sound: bus, James, house. This is a matter of house style: most guides suggest the same rules as before: the bus's route, James's friends, my house's roof. Others (especially in journalism) suggest just an apostrophe without the additional s. Some have different rules depending on whether the s is sounded like an s or a z; some have different rules based on whether it's a word of one syllable or more. But it's usually best to go with apostrophe-s with all singular nouns, whether or not they end in s. [Entry added 12 July 2005; revised 24 December 2006.]

i was.

now, as an addendum (this was already previously posted and i just remembered something), i forgot to point out that we had to completely change the sign because my roommate still did not believe that i was right. instead of saying "we heart the munnses" it read "we heart the munns boys". problem solved.