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greengrocer's apostrophe

noun

Etymology

From the relatively common misusage of apostrophes seen on the placards used at greengroceries.

Definitions

  1. An incorrectly used apostrophe

    An incorrectly used apostrophe; (especially) one mistakenly used to form the plural of a noun, for example: writing the plural of banana as banana's (a possessive) instead of bananas.

    • [A] flashing neon sign advertising the Pari's Hotel is less an early case of greengrocer's apostrophe than a sardonic Pascalian allusion (pari in French meaning 'bet').
    • It is hardly surprising that these conventions seem to be in rapid collapse, with what has been called "the greengrocer's apostrophe" (apple's 60p, Antique's, linguistic's, and perhaps even mean't, all personally attested) […]

The neighborhood

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sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA