Booher's Rules of Business Grammar - Dianna Booher 2009

Do you love me—or what i can do for you?
Perplexing possessives

POSSESSIVES BEFORE GERUNDS

What do these sentences have in common?

“Do you mind me smoking?”

“Our city ordinance restricts him driving while talking on a cell phone.”

“I heard him sneezing.”

All three of them are wrong. They should be correctly written this way:

“Do you mind my smoking?”

“Our city ordinance restricts his driving while talking on a cell phone.”

“I heard his sneezing.”

Here’s why: the —ing word or phrase (verb plus —ing) that follows is playing the role of a noun (person, place, thing, or idea), not a descriptive word. (The grammatical term for this construction is a gerund: a verb ending in —ing serving as a noun.)

If you substitute another noun for the —ing words in the previous sentences, you’ll see the point quickly.

“Do you mind me accent?” (strange, eh?)

“Do you mind my accent?” (easy to understand with a plain noun)

“Our city ordinance restricts him gun.” (strange, eh?)

“Our city ordinance restricts his gun.” (easy to understand with a plain noun)

“I heard him outburst.” (strange, eh?)

“I heard his outburst.” (easy to understand with a plain noun)

Here’s what complicates things: Sometimes both versions of a sentence (with and without the possessive form) can be correct because both are logical meanings. Here’s an example where that’s true:

The boss resents that engineer’s highlighting his mistakes in the meeting.

The boss resents that engineer highlighting his mistakes in the meeting.

In the first example, the boss resents what the engineer did in the meeting. In the second example, the boss resents the engineer himself. The fact that he was highlighting his mistakes in the meeting simply identifies which engineer the boss is talking about among several engineers who may work there.

My point: the correct form of the pronoun dictates the meaning of the sentence.

Memory tip

Ask this simple question: are you emphasizing the person or the person’s action? If your point is the action, use the possessive form before the activity.