Use an Apostrophe in Contractions

Some readers of formal academic writing object to contractions — shortened forms that leave out some letters of the original words (for example, you’re is a contraction of you are, and don’t is a contraction of do not). Other readers don’t mind contractions. If you include them in your writing, be sure to use an apostrophe to indicate where letters (or numbers) are missing:

I can’t help thinking that my parents were naive in the ’90s, but I’ll never get them to agree with that.

When an apostrophe comes at the beginning of a word or number, your word-processing software will probably turn it into an opening single quotation mark, which faces the wrong way. To get it right, add a second apostrophe, which the software will turn into a closing single quotation mark, and then delete the first one.