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submitted 11 months ago by Slinky5737@infosec.pub to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml

For example, English speakers commonly mix up your/you're or there/their/they're. I'm curious about similar mistakes in other languages.

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[-] lvxferre@lemmy.ml 3 points 11 months ago

Technically not an error but still annoying is to append an apostrophe and an s to a name to indicate the genitive.

Even technically I'd consider it an error - the genitive/"possessive" apostrophe in English highlights that you're dealing with a clitic, attached to the end of the noun phrase; e.g. the dog**'s** food` โ†’ the dog and the cat**'s** food. In German however it doesn't behave like a clitic, it's a plain declension; e.g. das Futter des Hundes โ†’ das Futter des Hundes und der Katze - you're switching words, not moving them.

I wonder if that's because most people nowadays use von+Dative instead.

[-] tvarog_smetana@lemm.ee 2 points 11 months ago

Not a native speaker, so I could be wrong about this:

I've seen a construction using proper nouns (eg. Annas Haus) where an "s" indicates possession, but no apostrophe. This doesn't seem to apply to non-proper nouns (das Haus der Frau) and is different from normal genitive construction that adds an "s" to masc/neut noun genders (das Haus des Mannes)

this post was submitted on 27 Nov 2023
136 points (96.6% liked)

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