possessive
- 01 B2 Upper Intermediate
adj.demanding someone's total attention and not wanting them to be independent or spend time with others.
adj.manifesting a desire to exert excessive control or ownership over another person, typically within a romantic or familial relationship.
Simple“He became very possessive and didn't like it when his girlfriend went out with her own friends.”
In context“The protagonist's possessive nature eventually alienated his partner, as his constant need for reassurance manifested as restrictive and jealous behaviour.”
Teacher's tipThis sense carries a negative social connotation; it describes a personality flaw rather than a positive trait.
SynonymsAntonyms - 02 B2 Upper Intermediate
adj.relating to owning something or showing who something belongs to.
adj.pertaining to the legal or physical possession of property or assets.
Simple“The cat has a very possessive attitude toward its favourite blanket.”
In context“The company maintains a possessive interest in the patent, refusing to license the technology to any of its primary competitors.”
Synonyms - 03 B1 Intermediate
adj.describing a word or form that shows who owns something, like 'mine' or 'the dog's'.
adj.denoting a grammatical case or form used to indicate a relationship of possession, origin, or association.
Simple“In the phrase 'my car', the word 'my' is a possessive adjective.”
In context“Learners often struggle with the placement of the apostrophe when forming the possessive plural of irregular nouns.”
UsageIn linguistics, this is often used interchangeably with 'genitive' in English instruction.
Teacher's tipWhile 'genitive' is the technical linguistic term, 'possessive' is the standard term used in most EFL classrooms.
Synonymsgenitive - 04 B2 Upper Intermediate
n.a word or a form of a word that shows ownership.
n.a noun or pronoun in the possessive case.
Simple“You need to add an apostrophe and an 's' to make the possessive of most singular nouns.”
In context“The student mistakenly used a possessive where a simple plural was required, leading to confusion in the sentence's meaning.”
UsageUsually functions as a countable noun when referring to specific words.
From Middle French possessif, from Latin possessivus (“of or pertaining to possession”), from possessiō (“possessing”), from possidēre (“to possess”). By surface analysis, possess + -ive.
Etymology adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.