| 7:19:39 AM - Sat, 7th May 2011 |
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It's Mother's Day in many countries tomorrow and this throws up an interesting point about apostrophes.
The day belongs to all mothers, so in theory we should be talking about
Mothers' Day
That is, with the apostrophe coming after the plural. However, in by far the majority of cases you will see this written as:
Mother's Day
That is, in a singular form. Why is that?
The answer has to do with the subtext; on Mother's Day we do not honour all mothers per se, but it is much more personal and we honour our own mother only. Mother's Day for me is about my mother, not about mothers in general.
This can be compared to April Fools' Day where the apostrophe makes it clear we are talking about ALL fools on that day, not just a particular fool.
But there are complications. In America they celebrate Veterans Day which is usually written without an apostrophe at all. A US government website claims that no apostrophe is needed since the day does not "belong" to the veterans, instead it is for honouring them.ref
(By removing the apostrophe from Veterans Day, this turns "veterans" into an adjective which describes the day.)
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Edited On 7:21:35 AM - Sat, 7th May 2011 by WikiSysop
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