S-form
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The s-form[1] is the British English phenomenon (predominantly in speech[2]) of suffixing the letter s to business names (especially to the names of supermarkets) where there is not one present in the orthographic representation. For example 'ASDA' could be converted to 'ASDAs' in speech, 'Tesco' to 'Tescos', etc.
[edit] Causes
Possible causes for use of the s-form include a third-person verb ending, contraction of 'is' or pluralisation but it is most likely that the s-form is an overgeneralisation of possessive suffixion in business names. [3]
[edit] References
[edit] Sources
- Woodward, Lorraine (February 2004). "The supermarket storm: an investigation into an aspect of variation". . Lancaster University Retrieved on 2008-04-06.