Which is better?
A. In the space shuttle’s case, the vehicle lands like a plane.
B. In the case of the space shuttle, the vehicle lands like a plane.
Or, for a more easily understood example:
A. In flower’s case, minerals, water and sunlight are essential.
B. In the case of flowers, minerals, water and sunlight are essential.
I hope you picked B.
There is a lot of confusion about using “in my case.” It starts when we try to talk about other things. We say:
“In Science’s case….” This is awkward. And it is especially awkward when we say “car’s case” (a word ending in an ‘s’).
We should’t say “in car’s case” for two reasons：
First, it should be “the car’s,” but we shouldn’t put ‘s after ‘car’ to begin with. A car cannot own anything. It’s not alive.
Second, as we are speaking about a car specific to our example–such as in the case of ”our car” or a car in our situation, it becomes “the car.” So we say “in the case of the car”
Now that we have that cleared up, it is far easier to say:
“with the car,” which has the same conversational meaning as “in the case of the car.”
Similarly, we say, “with me,” as in:
With me, I don’t like carrying umbrellas.
Of course we can simply say, “I don’t like carrying umbrellas.” But of course, as you are a person and you can possess experiences, you can say:
In my case, I don’t like umbrellas. This sounds technical, cold, clinical. Any time you use the word ‘case’, you sound like a clinician, a doctor, a scientist–a nerd if you are not one of those professionals or speaking in a professional situation.
So, I ask you once again:
A. In the Saturn Five rocket’s case, the vehicle loses sections as they run out of Fuel.
B. In the case of the Saturn Five rocket, the vehicle loses sections as they run out of fuel.
I hope you picked B. And of course, we can say:
A. With the Saturn Five rocket, the vehicle loses sections as they run out of Fuel.
Now look at this:
My brother is always late; in the case of my sister, I can depend on her being on time.
We change the sentence to a less technical and more casual sounding expression:
My brother is always late (We don’t need to reference his case; we aim to speak simply in English); with my sister, I can depend on her being on time.
Any questions?
CA
