Double possessives. Words that do double duty. The monkeys aren't working.
Grammar Girl: For Writers and Language Lovers.
Mignon Fogarty, Inc.
4.5 • 2.9K Ratings
🗓️ 12 August 2025
⏱️ 15 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
1107. This week, we look at double possessives, such as "a friend of Mignon's" and whether they are grammatically correct. Then, we look at words that do double duty, from the nautical origins of "scuttlebutt" to "beetle" — which can be both an insect and a tool.
The double possessives segment was written by Susan Herman, a retired multidisciplined language analyst, analytic editor, and instructor for the federal government.
The words doing double duty segment was written by Karen Lunde. Karen's a career writer and editor who drifted into marketing—which turned out to be creative storytelling in business-casual clothes. These days, she helps solo business owners find the right words to talk about their work. Find her at chanterellemarketingstudio.com.
🔗 Share your familect recording in a WhatsApp chat.
🔗 Watch my LinkedIn Learning writing courses.
🔗 Subscribe to the newsletter.
🔗 Take our advertising survey.
🔗 Get the edited transcript.
🔗 Get Grammar Girl books.
🔗 Join Grammarpalooza. Get ad-free and bonus episodes at Apple Podcasts or Subtext. Learn more about the difference.
| HOST: Mignon Fogarty
| VOICEMAIL: 833-214-GIRL (833-214-4475).
| Grammar Girl is part of the Quick and Dirty Tips podcast network.
- Audio Engineer: Dan Feierabend
- Director of Podcast: Holly Hutchings
- Advertising Operations Specialist: Morgan Christianson
- Marketing and Video: Nat Hoopes
| Theme music by Catherine Rannus.
| Grammar Girl Social Media: YouTube. TikTok. Facebook.Threads. Instagram. LinkedIn. Mastodon. Bluesky.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Grammar Girl here. I'm Injohn Fogarty, your friendly guide to the English language. Today, |
| 0:10.4 | we're going to double your pleasure and double your fun. First, we'll talk about double possessives, |
| 0:15.5 | and then we'll talk about words that do double duty. Way back in episode 449, we addressed a follower's question about |
| 0:24.5 | the use of double possessives, sometimes called double genitives. That's when we mark possession |
| 0:30.2 | twice, usually with of an apostrophe S, as in a friend of squiggly's, or of a possessive pronoun as in a friend of mine. But with the first |
| 0:41.1 | example, is a friend of squiggly acceptable without the apostrophe S at the end of squiggly? Well, in the |
| 0:48.0 | previous episode, the bottom line was double possessive does have legitimate uses, but you might |
| 0:53.9 | want to avoid it in formal writing and perhaps use only one possessive does have legitimate uses, but you might want to avoid it in formal writing |
| 0:55.7 | and perhaps use only one possessive at a time if it sounds natural. So your best bet would be just |
| 1:02.1 | Squiggly's friend. The question of double possessives is complex, or at least it seems that way. |
| 1:09.8 | Phil from North Carolina recently submitted virtually |
| 1:12.8 | the same question I received 10 years ago, asking, if Harry is Bruce's friend, is it correct |
| 1:20.1 | to say he's a friend of Bruce, as opposed to he's a friend of Bruce's? The former doesn't sound |
| 1:26.5 | quite right, possibly because of the common |
| 1:28.8 | usage of the alternative, which seems to be a double possessive. Phil is correct on both counts. |
| 1:36.9 | A friend of Bruce sounds awkward to some people, and the commonly used a friend of Bruce's is a |
| 1:43.1 | double possessive and perfectly legal. |
| 1:45.8 | So let's break this down a little more and see what the most prevalent style guides have to say. |
| 1:51.7 | Of course, the normal way to form possessives in English is either with an apostrophe S or with the word of. |
| 1:59.7 | The example we gave in episode 449 is the UK's crown jewels, |
| 2:05.6 | or the crown jewels of the UK. Both are grammatical. But what if we use a double possessive? |
| 2:13.2 | Is it the Grammar Girl podcast of Mignon or the Grammar Girl podcast of Mignon's with the apostrophe S? |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Mignon Fogarty, Inc., and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Mignon Fogarty, Inc. and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.