# Why Still the Possessive Case (in English)?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-still-the-possessive-case-in-english/702671>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [October 27, 2014, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-still-the-possessive-case-in-english/702671 "2014-10-27T18:11:18Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\
**Post date:** [October 29, 2014, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-still-the-possessive-case-in-english/702671/21 "2014-10-29T14:52:38Z")

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> [@Leo\_Bloom](#):
>
> Homeward/homewards? Toward/towards?
> 
> Isn’t that a genitive thing? (Besides being a bugaboo of mine because I never know which one.)

Yep. So is “always,” “sometimes,” and dialectal “go a ways.”

> [@](#):
>
> **Me** thinks dative survives. Or when my mother said, “cry me a river.” Ethically.

I saw what you did there.  
It survives in syntax but not morphology.

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**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\
**Post date:** [October 29, 2014, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-still-the-possessive-case-in-english/702671/22 "2014-10-29T15:02:27Z")

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**Leo Bloom** did pick up on something significant: the fact that true cases in English survive only in pronouns.

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