Word Confusion: Who’s versus Whose

Posted October 17, 2016 by Kathy Davie in Author Resources, Self-Editing, Word Confusions, Writing

Revised as of
8 Dec 2023

The words who’s and whose sound so similar, and they are from the same root, hwā, but that doesn’t make it the same. The primary confusion writers have with these two words is the contraction for who’s, a.k.a. “who is”.

It’s essential to pay attention to that apostrophe and the missing letter it represents. (You may want to explore the post, “Apostrophe“, for a more in-depth look at how this bit of punctuation affects contractions.)

Other “Who” Posts

To avoid confusions, there are other posts that explore the who versus . . . question, including:

Word Confusions . . .

. . . started as my way of dealing with a professional frustration with properly spelled words that were out of context in manuscripts I was editing as well as books I was reviewing. It evolved into a sharing of information with y’all. I’m hoping you’ll share with us words that have been a bête noire for you from either end.

If you found this post on “Who’s versus Whose” interesting, consider subscribing to KD Did It, if you’d like to track this post for future updates.

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Who’s
(who is/ who has)
Whose

Poster

Who’s Who in the Zoo, 4 June 1937, is a poster about an illustrated natural history prepared by the WPA Federal Writers Project. It’s attributed to Sidney Jacobson and is under the Public Domain Mark 1.0 license, via Picryl.


An overblown poster in pale pink, gold, brown, and yellow.

Whose Baby are You? is a theatrical poster of a Mark E Swann production and is under the Public Domain Mark 1.0 license courtesy of the Library of Congress, via Picryl.

Part of Grammar:
Personal Pronoun in the Nominative (or Subjective) Case:

  1. Interrogative Pronoun
  2. Relative Pronoun
  3. Restrictive Identifier
Possessive Adjective
Possessive Pronoun
Contraction for who is or who has


Interrogative Pronoun:
What or which person or people

Relative Pronoun:
Used to introduce a clause giving further information about a person or people previously mentioned

  • [Archaic] The person that
  • Whoever

Restrictive Identifier:
Specifically identifies what or which

my, mine, your, yours, his, her, hers, its, our, ours, their, theirs


A possessive in that the noun that follows belongs to or is associated with a person or object mentioned


Interrogative Possessive Determiner AND Pronoun:
Belonging to or associated with which person

Relative Possessive Determiner:
Of whom or which (used to indicate that the following noun belongs to or is associated with the person or thing mentioned in the previous clause)

Can replace of which, especially when the subject is not human

Examples:
Interrogative Pronoun:
Who’s out there?

Who’s that idiot?

Who’s done the reading?

Relative Pronoun:
Joan Fontaine plays the mouse who’s married to the playboy.

There’s this guy at work, who’s one of my friends, well he’s never been on a train.

She’s going out with a bloke who’s in the army.

Restrictive Identifier:
The suspect in the lineup who’s got red hair committed the crime.

It’s specifically identifies the one with red hair as the one who did it.

She’s the one who’s eating her vegetables.

It’s the only girl who is eating vegetables.

Who’s getting out of the red car?

It’s not the person getting out of any other color car.

Interrogative Possessive Determiner AND Pronoun:
Whose keys are these?

Whose kids are those?

Whose round is it?

A minivan was parked at the curb, and Juliet wondered whose it was.

The company whose stock rose faster was able to expand more quickly.

It was a book whose conclusion was unforgettable.

Relative Possessive Determiner:
He’s a man whose opinion I respect.

John works with that other chap whose name I can’t remember.

Whose little brother is he?

History of the Word:
Before 900, Old English and Middle English hwā is cognate with the Old High German hwer, the Gothic hwas, and the Latin quis. Old English hwæs, genitive of hwā meaning who and hwæt meaning what.

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C’mon, get it out of your system, bitch, whine, moan . . . which words are your pet peeves? Also, please note that I try to be as accurate as I can, but mistakes happen or I miss something. Email me if you find errors, so I can fix them . . . and we’ll all benefit!

Satisfy your curiosity about other Word Confusions on its homepage or more generally explore the index of self-editing posts. You may also want to explore Book Layout & Formatting Ideas, Formatting Tips, Grammar Explanations, Linguistics, Publishing Tips, the Properly Punctuated, Writing Ideas and Resources, and Working Your Website.

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Resources for Who’s versus Whose

Apple Dictionary.com

Cambridge Dictionary: Relative Pronouns, whose

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Pinterest Photo Credits

This photo, Dr. Who, by aussiegall from Sydney, Australia, was a result of playing with a Tardis money box that was sitting on her cupboard. “Thought it would a fun to take a picture of it and do a touch of photoshopping.” She has released it under a CC BY 2.0 license, via Wikimedia Commons.

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