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Which of the following is (more) correct or are they both acceptable?

I apologise for your receiving emails.

or

I apologise for you receiving emails.

I think I read somewhere (but can't find the reference) that the first one is more correct.

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    Neither makes any sense unless the sentence continues with e.g. "... receiving spam e-mails apparently sent by me" or "... receiving emails from me after asking to be removed from my mailing list." Else, why are you apologising that I receive e-mails?!
    – TrevorD
    Commented Aug 16, 2013 at 12:05
  • Also related: english.stackexchange.com/q/81525/8019
    – Tim Lymington
    Commented Aug 16, 2013 at 12:13
  • Thanks @TimLymington and @RegDwigh; I had a feeling there was already a question about this (but just didn't know what keywords to search).
    – Appulus
    Commented Aug 16, 2013 at 13:54
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    To me, both versions turn the apology on its head. Why should I apologize for something you are doing? Why not just say, "I apologize for emailing you" or "I apologize for any inconvenience my email caused you"?
    – Jeff Cohan
    Commented Aug 17, 2013 at 6:47

1 Answer 1

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As a native english speaker I would say the second one sounds more correct, because in the first case I feel it would have to be "I apologise for your reception of emails." Since your is possessive there would have to be a noun following.

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  • But there is a noun following.
    – RegDwigнt
    Commented Aug 16, 2013 at 12:04

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