Its been awhile since I gave a grammar lesson on Facebook; but since this is a subject that regularly comes up around the new year, I thought it was worth addressing. New Year or New Years or New Years Ok. There are many who struggle with choosing the correct salutation, which has led other well-meaning folks to offer often incomplete and/or inaccurate explanations for which is correct to use. Heres my New Years gift to you: Happy New Year (correct) Happy New Years (correct) Happy New Years (incorrect) The explanation: Happy New Years is an abbreviation, like congrats (short for congratulations), and is colloquially and grammatically acceptable. As with an implied subject in a sentence, the audience is expected to understand that words (in this case, eve or day) were intentionally omitted for brevity. The confusion arises when the salutation is spoken as opposed to written. Some people assume that the ending s sound is an indication of pluralization rather than possession. That assumption may be correct depending on who is speaking; but give the speaker the benefit of the doubt. If you cant let it go and for whatever reason need to flex your grammatical muscle, ask the speaker to spell years in the context of new years. If the speaker omits the apostrophe, you will know that your assumption of the speakers ignorance was correct; but youll also run the risk of proving true the old adage about what happens when you ASS-U-ME. Err on the side of caution and courtesy and just say Happy New Year/Years in return, raise your glass, and keep it moving. #MyTwoCents #TheMoreYouKnow #EachOneTeachOne (Now if anyone types Happy New Years leading into 2015, I give you my blessing to use whatever means necessary to bring them into the fold of proper grammar usage. 😉)
Posted on: Tue, 30 Dec 2014 23:22:02 +0000