Possessive form of in-law

Question

I need a bit of help with this.

She is a photographer but that camera is her brother's-in-law

or:

She is a photographer but that camera is her brother-in-law's

I am aware that I could change the construction to make things easier, like:

She is a photographer but that camera belongs to her brother-in-law

However, I would really like to find out what's the correct way to write the sentence.

brother-in-law is considered one word, so you would use "brother-in-law's". The dashes indicate this. — user3169, Jun 10 '16 at 21:21
@J.R. I don't think you should edit in the dashes since that partly explains the answer. — user3169, Jun 10 '16 at 21:22
user3169 explains it. It might make it easier to see if we use a different example: "That chair is the King of Spain's" - not "the King's of Spain"! — stangdon, Jun 10 '16 at 21:24
@user3169 - That's a valid point. Feel free to edit them back out. — J.R., Jun 10 '16 at 21:31

score 2 · Answer 1 · edited Dec 25 '18 at 21:47

2

The hyphenation in the word

brother-in-law

makes it a compound noun, in which case the possessive is

brother-in-law's ( the plural possessive is brothers-in-law's )
mother-in-law's
Commander-in-Chief's

even if the hyphens are not explicit, if a group of words are being treated as a compound noun, the possessive is at the end

the President of the United States' plane

here

the Queen of England's crown

here

the Greatest of All Time's smile

here

the hottest model in the world's hair

enter image description here

edited Dec 25 '18 at 21:47

Glorfindel

answered Jun 10 '16 at 21:32

Peter

Good examples! But I can understand how this might be confusing for a learner, particularly since the plural form is brothers-in-law. – J.R. Jun 10 '16 at 21:46

1 Answers1