Which phrase is more proper?
July 29, 2011 9:12 AM Subscribe
Some how I came up with a grammer question with someone and need help solving it. We were sending this in an email to family.
I say: Celebrate your life's Connections...
She Says: Celebrate your life Connections...
Which one is correct or more appropriate?
I don't think either one is wrong, but the former is more appropriate.
"Life" can work as an modifier, so "life connections" could be analogous to, say "work connections." Still, it sounds weird to me—it doesn't have a clear meaning.
"Life's connections" seems analogous to, say, "life's work"—connections that have been accumulating over the course of your lifetime.
posted by adamrice at 9:17 AM on July 29, 2011
"Life" can work as an modifier, so "life connections" could be analogous to, say "work connections." Still, it sounds weird to me—it doesn't have a clear meaning.
"Life's connections" seems analogous to, say, "life's work"—connections that have been accumulating over the course of your lifetime.
posted by adamrice at 9:17 AM on July 29, 2011
I'd just re-write it to be clearer, along the lines of: "Celebrate the connections in your life."
Without context, to me, 'Life Connections', as a phrase, especially with capitalization, feels like a product or something being marketed.
posted by cobaltnine at 9:20 AM on July 29, 2011 [4 favorites]
Without context, to me, 'Life Connections', as a phrase, especially with capitalization, feels like a product or something being marketed.
posted by cobaltnine at 9:20 AM on July 29, 2011 [4 favorites]
This is not a grammar question; it's more a question of idiom. "Life's connections" seems more customary, suggesting the "connections" one builds during one's life. "Life connections" is not unidiomatic (cf. "life insurance") but has a more new-agey feel (cf. "dream work" or "life partner").
Simplicity is usually best. I'd write "Celebrate your family" or "Celebrate your connections" or something.
posted by Admiral Haddock at 9:21 AM on July 29, 2011 [2 favorites]
Simplicity is usually best. I'd write "Celebrate your family" or "Celebrate your connections" or something.
posted by Admiral Haddock at 9:21 AM on July 29, 2011 [2 favorites]
"Celebrate your life's connections" puts the emphasis on connections, and seems to address the reader's life specifically.
"Celebrate your life connections" is less specific; life describes the connections (as opposed to owning the connections, as in the first choice).
I think they're both appropriate, but like brainmouse, am unsure why you've capitalized "Connection." If it's a title, then it ought to be capitalized as follows: "Celebrate Your Life/Life's Connections."
posted by smirkette at 9:21 AM on July 29, 2011
"Celebrate your life connections" is less specific; life describes the connections (as opposed to owning the connections, as in the first choice).
I think they're both appropriate, but like brainmouse, am unsure why you've capitalized "Connection." If it's a title, then it ought to be capitalized as follows: "Celebrate Your Life/Life's Connections."
posted by smirkette at 9:21 AM on July 29, 2011
Life = A category of connections. I think this is less personal.
Life's = Anthropomorphizing "life." I think this is more woo-woo and conversational.
posted by rhizome at 9:29 AM on July 29, 2011 [1 favorite]
Life's = Anthropomorphizing "life." I think this is more woo-woo and conversational.
posted by rhizome at 9:29 AM on July 29, 2011 [1 favorite]
Either could be correct depending on what you're trying to say with it, and without knowing that, there really isn't a way to answer this. Can you give a little more context about what the intended message is?
Either way I agree that "Celebrate the connections in your life" is probably the best way to put this.
posted by FAMOUS MONSTER at 9:39 AM on July 29, 2011
Either way I agree that "Celebrate the connections in your life" is probably the best way to put this.
posted by FAMOUS MONSTER at 9:39 AM on July 29, 2011
BTW, either way "connections" is not a proper noun and shouldn't be capitalized.
posted by litnerd at 10:01 AM on July 29, 2011
posted by litnerd at 10:01 AM on July 29, 2011
Best answer: "Lifelong" would do a lot better than either "life" or "life's" here. "Life connections" sounds like a brand name or a New Age seminar, as Admiral Haddock says, so if you really have to choose one of these options, go with "life's."
But really, the reason people are asking what you actually mean is that "connections" is a very vague, fuzzy word to use here. It reads more like a placeholder than a meaningful noun, because it invites but doesn't answer the question of to whom or to what the connections are connected. It'd be better (that is, more meaningfully specific, less hand-wavey) to fill that in, either by substitution or expansion: "Celebrate the important people in your life," or "Celebrate your connections to people."
Life's = Anthropomorphizing "life."
Utter nonsense. Genitive/possessive is perfectly correctly used for nouns that aren't people.
posted by RogerB at 10:22 AM on July 29, 2011 [2 favorites]
But really, the reason people are asking what you actually mean is that "connections" is a very vague, fuzzy word to use here. It reads more like a placeholder than a meaningful noun, because it invites but doesn't answer the question of to whom or to what the connections are connected. It'd be better (that is, more meaningfully specific, less hand-wavey) to fill that in, either by substitution or expansion: "Celebrate the important people in your life," or "Celebrate your connections to people."
Life's = Anthropomorphizing "life."
Utter nonsense. Genitive/possessive is perfectly correctly used for nouns that aren't people.
posted by RogerB at 10:22 AM on July 29, 2011 [2 favorites]
Celebrate your life's Connections -> possessive. Celebrate the Connections of your life.
Celebrate your life Connections -> adjective. Celebrate your life Connections, life style, life partner, life match, life goals.
If you capitalized "Life" in the second example, as in "Celebrate your Life Connections", it would be less disconcerting to the eye, I think. (Title Case, so capitalizing is perfectly correct; that it's not done in the first example is, I assume, for reasons of emphasis.)
But you could choose either one.
posted by tel3path at 3:06 PM on July 29, 2011
Celebrate your life Connections -> adjective. Celebrate your life Connections, life style, life partner, life match, life goals.
If you capitalized "Life" in the second example, as in "Celebrate your Life Connections", it would be less disconcerting to the eye, I think. (Title Case, so capitalizing is perfectly correct; that it's not done in the first example is, I assume, for reasons of emphasis.)
But you could choose either one.
posted by tel3path at 3:06 PM on July 29, 2011
Utter nonsense.
Maybe, but on reflection, "life('s)" is redundant on "your" in this context anyway.
posted by rhizome at 7:32 AM on August 3, 2011
Maybe, but on reflection, "life('s)" is redundant on "your" in this context anyway.
posted by rhizome at 7:32 AM on August 3, 2011
This thread is closed to new comments.
b) what are you trying to say? I can see how both would be appropriate, but they have different meanings. That said, "Celebrate your life's Connections" makes a heck of a lot more sense to me in most contexts, but why is Connections capitalized?
posted by brainmouse at 9:14 AM on July 29, 2011 [2 favorites]