When is it correct to create a contraction of words followed by is? For instance is who’s a correct short form of who is?
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or even "who was"?– Robert KoritnikCommented Mar 18, 2011 at 14:30
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1@Robert: I think "who has" but not "who was"– HenryCommented Apr 29, 2012 at 18:58
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2 Answers
The word "is" can always be contracted, provided it is not stressed - though this is considered somewhat informal.
So, in informal contexts,
Fred is taller than Jim.
can be shortened to
Fred's taller than Jim.
...it doesn't depend on what word comes before "is". But if the is is emphatic:
Fred is taller than Jim.
then it would be wrong to contract that to
* Fred's taller than Jim.
That is probably fairly obvious - if you are stressing a particular word, it doesn't pay to shorten it. But there are also other situations where the is has the emphasis, for instance
I don't know what it is.
cannot be contracted to
* I don't know what it's.
even though
I don't know what it is doing.
can be reduced to
I don't know what it's doing.
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I think in ordinary, non-emphatic speech (but not writing unless it is intending to mimic speech), it's not so much that you "can" contract is, but rather that speakers practically always do. Commented Mar 18, 2011 at 12:04
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@psmears, Why can't ""I don't know what it is."" be reduced?– PacerierCommented May 6, 2017 at 6:53
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@Pacerier: As it says in the answer, you can't contract/reduce "is" when it is stressed. In "I don't know what it is", the word "is" is stressed, so you can't contract it.– psmearsCommented May 8, 2017 at 13:25
Who's is the correct contraction of who is, in the same way let's is the contraction of let us.
There are no grammatical rules about not using 's as a contraction of is.
In some cases, there could be a confusion between 's used as contraction of is, and 's used as possessive, but the rest of the sentence should clarify which is the exact meaning of the contraction.
Geraldine's back
Barak's thinking
answered Mar 18, 2011 at 8:44
