5 ms·

Of Maine. Don't need the 's.

• Dalewyn 3y ago
  "He's been robbed." English here to slap you with the Correct Use of the Incorrect.
  • philipov 3y ago
    In both cases, the 's does not indicate plurality. It is a contraction of "He has been robbed." "Maine has just had its data stolen." In the second case, depending on your dialect, you could remove either 'has' or 'just', but not both. In the first case, you can't substitute 'has' with 'just', but you can use both. That's because "(has|just) had" is an idiomatic expression with different rules than "has (just) been".
    • Dalewyn 3y ago
      In case I wasn't clear, I agree that this grammar is correct despite looking very wrong to non-native speakers.
  • adolph 3y ago
    In the example given, the “apostrophe S” is a contraction of “he has” not a possession indicator. The word “of” established the relationship between “Entire Population” and “Maine.” The apostrophe S is redundant to the point of confusion, as if a word describing a class of things related to Maine were omitted in error, like maybe it was supposed to be “Entire Population of Maine’s Bricklayers and Sitar Players.” If one wanted to use a possessive noun then “Maine’s Entire Population.” https://www.grammarly.com/blog/possessive-nouns/ https://www.grammarly.com/blog/possessive-nouns/