The Possessive Case of the Noun
English nouns denoting living beings (and some lifeless things) have two cases:
· the common case, e.g. a girl, to a girl, with a girl, for a girl;
· the genitive (or possessive) case, e.g. the girl’s doll.
The Russian Cases are usually rendered into English by prepositions:
| Case | Preposition | Example |
| Родительный | Of | The subject of the article |
| Дательный | To/for | I gave some books to my sister. I bought some books for my students. |
| Творительный | By/ with | This book is written by … We write with a pencil. |
1. We show possession in English with the genitive form of a noun.
This means we normally use 's or s' for people and some living creatures.
□ Frank's car. (Not "the car of Frank/the car of Frank's").
□ a boy's tie; Tom's hat.
□ an actress's career; a waitress's job.
□ children's games; the men's club; sheep's wool.
□ the girls' uniforms.
□ Charles's address; Doris's panty; St. James's Park. Famous names ending in -s just add ('): Yeats' poetry (pronounced [s] or [iz]).
□ My friend Peter's watch; my father-in-law's house.
Ex.14 Replace the of-phrase by the noun in the Possessive Case:
1. The face of the woman is attractive. 2. The faces of these women are attractive. 3. The coat of my father-in-law is grey. 4. The coats of the passers-by are wet. 5. The voice of the man is too loud. 6. The voices of the men sound harsh. 7. The toys of the child are on the floor. 8. The toys of the children are on the floor.
Ex.15 Translate into English
1. Сын моей сестры хорошо учится. 2. Мне нравится квартира Марии. 3. Она много пишет сестрам Анны. 4. Вчера нас навестили дети наших друзей. 5. Комната Бесс большая и светлая. 6. Учитель вернул тетради студентов. 7. Я не помню имени сестры моего друга. 8. Друзья моего брата хорошо говорят по-немецки. 9. Это книги коллег моего сына. 10. Вам нравится новая книга этого писателя?
The Article
The article is a structural part of speech used with nouns. There are two articles in Modern English:
1. the indefinite article and
2. the definite article.
| Indefinite Article | Definite article | Zero article | |
| Form | a/ an | The | - |
| Usage | With Singular Countable Nouns | With Singular and Plural Countable and Uncountable Nouns | With Uncountable and Plural Countable Nouns |
| Mean ing | 1. = one Britain is an island. 2. for jobs I am a doctor. 3. in descriptions Madrid is a big city. | 1. to talk about definite people, things or ideas the hostel is not very far from here. 2. with some geographical names the USA 3. with the names of rivers, mountains, seas and oceans the Volga, the Alps, the Black Sea, the Atlantic Ocean | 1. to speak generally Teenagers are welcome here. Money is not everything. 2. with countries, towns, names of people Russia, France, Moscow, Mr. Brown 3. with nouns in certain phrases at home, at work, at university, at school with academic subjects: history |
Ex.1 Rewrite the following words using articles a/ an
Book, old book, university, engineer, man, game, computer, economist, actress, hour, assistant, nice day, address, brother
| singular | plural | |
| Indefinite situation | a | - |
| Definite situation | the | the |
Ex.2 Put in a/an or ‘-‘
1. Kate and Liz are _____ students. 2. Jack is ___ very nice person. You must meet him. 3. ___ tennis is ___ very popular sport. 4. I like working with ___ people. 5. Tom and Pam aren’t at ___ home now. 6. Are you interested in ___ Physics? 7. My mother is at ___ work now.
Ex. 3 Put in a/an or the
1. Rome is ___ capital of Italy. 2. Don’t sit on ___ chair. It’s dirty. 3. Peter and Mary have two children, ___ boy and ___ girl. ___ boy is 7 and ___ girl is 3. 4. What is ___ name of this village? 5. I live in ___ old house on the outskirts. It’s two miles from ___ city center. 6. In North Street you will see 3 houses: ___ red two-storey house, ___ blue three-storey house and ___ nice white house. I live in ___ white house. 7. Tim lives in ___ small village in ___ country. 8. Close ___ door, please. I’m cold.
Ex. 7 Use the article if it is necessary and tell your friend this story
Once … dog was crossing … small bridge. It was carrying … piece of … meat in … mouth. Suddenly … dog saw another dog in … river. … second dog was carrying … piece of meat, too, and looked exactly like … first dog. So … first dog jumped into … river. It wanted to get … other dog’s meat. But it dropped its meat and couldn’t find any dog at all. Why?