In the English language, nouns are inflected for grammatical number—that is, singular or plural. English is a West Germanic language originating in England and is the First language for most people in the United Kingdom, the United States Grammar is the field of Linguistics that covers the Rules governing the use of any given natural language. English grammar is a body of rules ( Grammar) specifying how phrases and sentences are constructed in the English language. In Traditional grammar, a contraction is the formation of a new Word from one or more individual words Disputed English grammar denotes disagreement about whether given constructions constitute correct English. A compound is a word composed of more than one Free morpheme. In the English language an English Honorific is something that is attached to but not usually part of a name e The personal pronouns of English can have various forms according to gender, number, person, and case. This article is focused mainly on usage of English relative clauses Principal parts A regular English verb has only one principal part, the infinitive or dictionary form (which is identical to the simple present tense for all persons and This is a paradigm of English verbs that is a set of conjugation tables for the model regular verbs and for some of the most common irregular verbs The English language has a large number of Irregular verbs. In the great majority of these the Past participle and/or Past tense is In the English language, a modal auxiliary verb is an Auxiliary verb (or helping verb) that can modify the Grammatical mood (or mode Gender in the English language has been the focus of two distinct debates A language is a dynamic set of visual auditory or tactile Symbols of Communication and the elements used to manipulate them In Grammar, inflection or inflexion is the way language handles grammatical relations and relational categories such as tense, mood, voice In linguistics grammatical number is a Grammatical category of nouns pronouns and adjective and verb agreement that expresses count distinctions (such as "one" In linguistics grammatical number is a Grammatical category of nouns pronouns and adjective and verb agreement that expresses count distinctions (such as "one" Plural is a Grammatical number, typically referring to more than one of the Referent in the real world This article discusses the variety of ways in which English plurals are formed.
Note that phonetic transcriptions provided in this article are for Received Pronunciation and General American. Received Pronunciation ( RP) is a form of Pronunciation of the English language (specifically British English) which has long been perceived as General American is an accent of American English within American English General American and accents approximating it are contrasted with Southern American
Regular plurals
The plural morpheme in English is suffixed to the end of most nouns. In Morpheme-based morphology, a morpheme is the smallest linguistic unit that has semantic meaning. An affix is a Morpheme that is attached to a stem to form a word The plural form is usually represented orthographically by adding -s to the singular form (see exceptions below). The orthography of a language specifies the correct way of using a specific Writing system to write the language The phonetic form of the plural morpheme is [z] by default. Examples:
| boy | boys | /bɔɪz/ |
| girl | girls | /gɜːlz/,/gɝlz/ |
| chair | chairs | /ʧɛəz/,/ʧɛɹz/ |
When the preceding sound is a voiceless consonant—such as [t], [p], or [k]—it is pronounced [s]. Voice or voicing is a term used in Phonetics and Phonology to characterize speech sounds, with sounds described as either voiceless In Articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a Speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the upper Vocal tract, the upper vocal Examples:
| cat | cats | /kæts/ |
| lap | laps | /læps/ |
| clock | clocks | /klɒks/,/klɑːks/ |
Where a noun ends in a sibilant sound—[s], [ʃ], [ʧ], [z], [ʒ], or [ʤ]—the plural is formed by adding [ɪz] (also pronounced [əz]), which is spelled -es if the word does not already end with -e:
| dish | dishes | /ˈdɪʃɪz/ |
| glass | glasses | /ˈglɑːsɪz/ |
| judge | judges | /ˈʤʌʤɪz/ |
| phase | phases | /ˈfeɪzɪz/ |
| witch | witches | /ˈwɪʧɪz/ |
Morphophonetically, these rules are sufficient to describe most English plurals. A sibilant is a type of Fricative or Affricate Consonant, made by directing a jet of air through a narrow channel in the Vocal tract towards However, there are several complications introduced in spelling.
The -oes rule: most nouns ending in o preceded by a consonant also form their plurals by adding -es (pronounced [z]):
| hero | heroes |
| potato | potatoes |
| volcano | volcanoes or volcanos |
The -ies rule: nouns ending in a y preceded by a consonant usually drop the y and add -ies (pronounced [iz]). In Articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a Speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the upper Vocal tract, the upper vocal This is taught to many American and British students with the rhyme: "Change the y to i and add es":
| cherry | cherries |
| lady | ladies |
However, proper nouns (particularly those for people or places) ending in a y preceded by a consonant form their plurals regularly [1][2]:
| Germany | Germanys (as in The two Germanys were unified in 1990; this rule is commonly not adhered to as several book titles show,[3][4] and Sicilies rather than Sicilys is the standard plural of Sicily) |
| Harry | Harrys (as in There are three Harrys in our office) |
The rule does not apply to words that are merely capitalized common nouns:
| P&O Ferries (from ferry) |
Other exceptions include lay-bys and stand-bys. The Kingdom of the Two Sicilies ( Regno delle Due Sicilie) commonly known as just the Two Sicilies, was the name of a Kingdom in Europe. Sicily ( Italian and Sicilian: Sicilia) is an autonomous region of Italy. A rest area, travel plaza, rest stop, or service area is a public facility located next to a large thoroughfare such as a Highway, Expressway
Words ending in a y preceded by a vowel form their plurals regularly:
| day | days |
| monkey | monkeys |
(Money/Monies is an exception, but money can also form its plural regularly. [5])
Almost-regular plurals
Many nouns of foreign origin, including almost all Italian loanwords, are exceptions to the -oes rule:
| canto | cantos |
| piano | pianos |
| portico | porticos |
| quarto (paper size) | quartos |
| kimono | kimonos |
Many nouns ending in a voiceless fricative mutate those sounds to a voiced fricative before adding the plural ending. Italian ( or lingua italiana) is a Romance language spoken by about 63 million people as a First language, primarily in Italy. Fricatives are Consonants produced by forcing air through a narrow channel made by placing two articulators close together Consonant mutation is the phenomenon in which a Consonant in a word is changed according to its morphological and/or syntactic environment In the case of [f] changing to [v] the mutation is indicated in the orthography as well; also, a silent e is added in this case if the singular does not already end with -e:
| bath | baths | /bɑːðz/, /bæθs/ |
| house | houses | /haʊzɪz/ |
| mouth | mouths | /maʊðz/ |
| calf | calves | /kɑːvz/,/kævz/ |
| knife | knives | /naɪvz/ |
In practice, many people do not change the fricative, and instead use regular plurals.
Some retain the voiceless consonant:
| moth | moths |
| place | places |
| proof | proofs |
Some can do either:
| dwarf1 | dwarfs/dwarves |
| hoof | hoofs/hooves |
| roof | roofs/rooves (latter archaic) |
| staff2 | staffs/staves |
| turf | turfs/turves (latter rare) |
Note 1: For dwarf, the common form of the plural was dwarfs—as, for example, in Walt Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs—until J. R. R. Tolkien popularized dwarves; he intended the changed spelling to differentiate the "dwarf" fantasy race in his novels from the cuter and simpler beings common in fairy tales, but his usage has since spread. Walter Elias Disney (December 5 1901 – December 15 1966 was a multiple Academy Award -winning American Film producer, director, Screenwriter Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is a 1937 American film based on the eponymous German fairy tale by the Brothers Grimm. There are many elements that show up throughout the fantasy genre in different guises Multiple astronomical dwarf stars and multiple nonmythological short human beings, however, remain dwarfs. The term dwarf star refers to a variety of distinct classes of Stars Dwarf star alone generally refers to any Main sequence star a star
Note 2: For staff in the sense of "a body of employees", the plural is always staffs; otherwise, both staffs and staves are acceptable, except in compounds; such as flagstaffs. Staves is rare in North America except in the sense of "magic rod. " The stave of a barrel or cask is a back-formation from staves, which is its plural. In Etymology, back-formation refers to the process of creating a new Lexeme (less precisely a new "word" by removing actual or supposed Affixes (See the Plural to singular by back-formation section below. )
Irregular plurals
There are many other less regular ways of forming plurals, usually stemming from older forms of English or from foreign borrowings.
Nouns with identical singular and plural
Some nouns spell their singular and plural exactly alike; some linguists regard these as regular plurals. Many of these are the names of animals:
- deer
- fish/fishes
- moose
- sheep
- swine
The plural deers is listed in some dictionaries,[6] but is considered by many to be an error.
Fish does have a regular plural form, but it differs in meaning from the unmarked plural; fishes refers to several species or other taxonomic types, while fish (plural) is used to describe multiple individual animals: one would say "the order of fishes," but "five fish in an aquarium. This article is about the taxonomic rank for the sequence of species in a taxonomic list see Taxonomic order In scientific classification used " The plural fishes is found in the King James Bible, in the miracle of the loaves and fishes, for example, and is sometimes used for rhetorical emphasis, as in phrases like sleep with the fishes. A miracle is an event believed to be caused by interposition of Divine intervention by a Supernatural being in the Universe by which the ordinary operation
Other nouns that have identical singular and plural forms include:
Note 3: Referring to individual songs in the blues musical style: "play me a blues"; "he sang three blues and a calypso"
Note 4: Referring, in the plural, to animals in a herd: "fifty head of cattle"
Irregular -(e)n plurals
The plural of a few nouns can also be formed from the singular by adding -n or -en, stemming from the obsolete Old English weak declension:
| ox | oxen | (particularly when referring to a team of draft animals, sometimes oxes e. The Blues is a vocal and instrumental form of Music based on the use of the Blue notes It emerged as an accessible form of self-expression g. in a metaphorical sense) |
| cow | kine | (archaic/regional; actually earlier plural "kye" [cf. Scots "kye" - "cows"] plus -en suffix, forming a double plural) |
| egg | eyren/eggys | (rare/dialectal Northern England & Scotland) |
| eye | eyen | (rare, found in some regional dialects) |
| shoe | shoon | (rare/dialectal) |
| house | housen | (rare/dialectal, used by Rudyard Kipling in Puck of Pook's Hill) |
| hose | hosen | (rare/archaic, used in King James Version of the Bible) |
| brother | brethren | (archaic plural of brother; earlier "brether" plus -en suffix, forming a double plural; now used in fraternal order) |
| child | children | (actually earlier plural "cildra/cildru" plus -en suffix, forming a double plural) |
The word box, referring to a computer, is semi-humorously pluralized boxen in the Leet dialect. Joseph Rudyard Kipling (30 December 1865 – 18 January 1936 was an English Author and poet Puck of Pook's Hill is a children's book by Rudyard Kipling, published in 1906 containing a series of short stories set in different periods of history Leet or Eleet (sometimes rendered l33t, 1337, or 31337) also known as Leetspeak, is an Alphabet used primarily on the Multiple Vax computers, likewise, are sometimes called Vaxen particularly if operating as a cluster, but multiple Unix systems are usually Unices (see Irregular plurals of foreign origin below).
The word sistren, referring to Christian sisters [cf. "brethren"], is also semi-humorously pluralized.
Umlaut plurals
The plural is sometimes formed by simply changing the vowel sound of the singular, in a process called umlaut (these are sometimes called mutated plurals):
| foot | feet |
| goose | geese |
| louse | lice |
| man | men |
| mouse | mice |
| tooth | teeth |
| woman | women |
Mouse is sometimes pluralized mouses in discussions of the computer mouse; however, mice is just as common. In Linguistics, umlaut (from German um - "around"/"the other way" + Laut "sound" is a process whereby a In Computing, a mouse (plural mice, mouse devices, or mouses)
Mongoose, however, has the plural mongooses.
Irregular plurals from Latin and Greek
English has borrowed a great many words from Latin and Classical Greek. Latin ( lingua Latīna, laˈtiːna is an Italic language, historically spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. Greek (el ελληνική γλώσσα or simply el ελληνικά — "Hellenic" is an Indo-European language, spoken today by 15-22 million people mainly The general trend with loanwords is toward what is called Anglicization or naturalization, that is, the re-formation of the word and its inflections as normal English words. A loanword (or loan word) is a word directly taken into one Language from another with little or no translation Many nouns (particularly ones from Latin) have retained their original plurals for some time after they are introduced. Other nouns have become Anglicized, taking on the normal "s" ending. In some cases, both forms are still competing.
The choice of a form can often depend on context: for a librarian, the plural of appendix is appendices (following the original language); for physicians, however, the plural of appendix is appendixes. Likewise, a radio engineer works with antennas and an entomologist deals with antennae. Choice of form can also depend on the level of discourse: correctly formed Latin plurals are found more often in academic and scientific contexts, whereas in daily speech the anglicized forms are more common. In the following table, the Latin plurals are listed, together with the Anglicized forms when they are more common.
- Final a becomes -ae (also -æ), or just adds -s:
| alumna | alumnae |
| formula | formulae/formulas |
| encyclopædia | encyclopædias (encyclopædiae is rare) |
- Final ex or ix becomes -ices (pronounced [ɪˌsiːz] or [əˌsiz]), or just adds -es:
| index | indices | /ˈɪndɪˌsiːz/ | or indexes |
| matrix | matrices | /ˈmeɪtɹɪˌsiːz/ | |
| vertex | vertices | /ˈvɜːtɪˌsiːz/,/ˈvɝtɪˌsiːz/ |
Some people treat process as if it belonged to this class, pronouncing processes /ˈpɹɑsɪˌsiːz/ instead of standard /ˈpɹɑsɛsɪz/. Since the word comes from Latin processus, whose plural is again processus, but now with a long u (fourth declension), this pronunciation is without etymological basis. Latin is an inflected language and as such its nouns pronouns and adjectives must be declined in order to serve a grammatical function
- Final is becomes es (pronounced [ˌiːz]):
| axis | axes | /ˈækˌsiːz/ |
| crisis | crises | /ˈkɹaɪˌsiːz/ |
| testis | testes | /ˈtɛsˌtiːz/ |
Note that axes, the plural of axis, is pronounced differently from axes (/ˈæksɪz/), the plural of ax(e).
- Final ies remains unchanged:
| series | series |
| species | species |
- Final on becomes -a:
| automaton | automata |
| criterion | criteria |
| phenomenon | phenomena (more below) |
| polyhedron | polyhedra |
- Final um becomes -a, or just adds -s:
| addendum | addenda |
| agendum (obsolete, not listed in most dictionaries) | agenda means a list of items of business at a meeting and has the plural agendas |
| datum | data (Now usually treated as a singular mass noun in both informal and educated usage, but usage in scientific publications shows a strong UK/US divide. U. S. usage prefers treating data in the singular in all contexts, including serious and academic publishing. [7][8][9] UK usage now widely accepts treating data as singular in standard English[10], including educated everyday usage[11] at least in non-scientific use. [6] UK scientific publishing usually still prefers treating it as a plural. [7]. Some UK university style guides recommend using data for both singular and plural use[8] and some recommend treating it only as a singular in connection with computers. [9]) In engineering, drafting, surveying, and geodesy, and in weight and balance calculations for aircraft, a datum (plural datums or data) is a reference point, surface, or axis on an object or the earth’s surface against which measurements are made. The center-of-gravity (CG is the point at which an aircraft would balance if it were possible to suspend it at that point Debt AIDS Trade in Africa (or DATA) is a Multinational non-government organization founded in January 2002 in London by U2 's |
| forum | fora/forums |
| medium | media (in communications and computers; now often treated as a singular mass noun)/ mediums (spiritualists, or items of medium size etc. ) |
| memorandum | memoranda/memorandums |
- Final us becomes -i (second declension, [aɪ]) or -era or -ora (third declension), or just adds -es (especially in fourth declension, where it would otherwise be the same as the singular):
| alumnus | alumni |
| corpus | corpora |
| focus | foci |
| genus | genera |
| prospectus | prospectuses (plural prospectus is rare) |
| radius | radii |
| viscus | viscera |
Virus had no plural ending in Latin; the plural in English is usually viruses. In Linguistics, declension (or declination) is the occurrence of Inflection in Nouns Pronouns and Adjectives indicating In Linguistics, declension (or declination) is the occurrence of Inflection in Nouns Pronouns and Adjectives indicating In Linguistics, declension (or declination) is the occurrence of Inflection in Nouns Pronouns and Adjectives indicating See plural of virus. In the English language, the plural of virus is viruses. In reference to a Computer virus, the plural is often believed to be virii or
| cactus | cactuses/cacti (in Arizona many people avoid either choice with cactus as both singular and plural. The State of Arizona ( is a state located in the southwestern region of the United States. ) |
| fungus | fungi |
| hippopotamus | hippopotamuses/hippopotami |
| octopus | octopuses (note: octopi also occurs, although it is strictly speaking unfounded[10], because it is not a Latin noun of the second declension, but rather a Latinized form of Greek ὀκτώπους. The theoretically correct form octopodes is rarely used. ) |
| platypus | platypuses (same as octopus: platypi occurs but is etymologically incorrect, and platypodes, while technically correct, is even rarer than octopodes) |
| terminus | termini/terminuses |
| uterus | uteri/uteruses |
Colloquial usages based in a humorous fashion on the second declension include Elvii to refer to multiple Elvis impersonators and Loti, used by petrolheads to refer to Lotus automobiles in the plural. An Elvis impersonator is someone who impersonates or copies famed American musician Elvis Presley, either as a Hobby, a Career in Entertainment Lotus Cars is a British manufacturer of sports and racing cars based at Hethel, Norfolk, England.
- Final as in one case of a noun of Greek origin changes to -antes:
| Atlas | Atlantes (statues of the hero); but |
| atlas | atlases (map collections) |
- Final ma in nouns of Greek origin can add -ta, although -s is usually also acceptable, and in many cases more common.
| stigma | stigmata/stigmas |
| stoma | stomata/stomas |
| schema | schemata/schemas |
| dogma | dogmata/dogmas |
| lemma | lemmata/lemmas |
Irregular plurals from other languages
- Some nouns of French origin add -x:
| beau | beaux |
| bureau | bureaus or bureaux |
| château | châteaux |
Foreign terms may take native plural forms, especially when the user is addressing an audience familiar with the language. French ( français,) is a Romance language spoken around the world by 118 million people as a native language and by about 180 to 260 million people In such cases, the conventionally formed English plural may sound awkward or be confusing.
- Nouns of Slavic origin add -a or -i according to native rules, or just -s:
| kniazhestvo | kniazhestva/kniazhestvos |
| kobzar | kobzari/kobzars |
| oblast | oblasti/oblasts |
- Nouns of Hebrew origin add -im or -ot (generally m/f) according to native rules, or just -s:
| cherub | cherubim/cherubs |
| matzah | matzot/matzahs |
| seraph | seraphim/seraphs |
Note that ot is pronounced os in the Ashkenazi dialect. The Slavic languages (also called Slavonic languages) a group of closely related Languages of the Slavic peoples and a subgroup of Indo-European languages Ashkenazi Jews, also known as Ashkenazic Jews or Ashkenazim ( Hebrew: אַשְׁכֲּנָזִים, ˌaʃkəˈnazim sing
- Many nouns of Japanese origin have no plural form and do not change:
| benshi | benshi |
| otaku | otaku |
| samurai | samurai |
However, other nouns such as kimonos, ninjas, futons, and tsunamis are more often seen with a regular English plural. is a language spoken by over 130 million people in Japan and in Japanese emigrant communities
- In New Zealand English, nouns of Māori origin can either take an -s or have no separate plural form. New Zealand English ( NZE, en-NZ) is the form of the English language used in New Zealand. Words more connected to Māori culture and used in that context tend to retain the same form, while names of flora and fauna may or may not take an -s, depending on context. Many as more correct regard omission:
| kiwi5 | kiwi/kiwis |
| kowhai | kowhai/kowhais |
| Māori6 | Māori/(occasionally Māoris) |
| marae | marae |
| tui | tuis/tui |
| waka | waka |
Note 5: When referring to the bird, kiwi may or may not take an -s; when used as an informal term for a New Zealander, it always takes an -s.
Note 6: Māori, when referring to a person of that ethnicity, does not usually take an -s. Many speakers avoid the use of Māori as a noun, and instead use it only as an adjective.
- In Canada and Alaska, some words borrowed from Inuktitut retain traditional plurals (see also Plurals of names of peoples, below):
| Inuk | Inuit |
| inukshuk | inukshuit |
- Nouns from languages other than the above generally form plurals as if they were native English words:
| canoe | canoes |
| cwm | cwms (Welsh valley) |
| igloo | igloos |
| kangaroo | kangaroos |
| kayak | kayaks |
| kindergarten | kindergartens |
| pizza | pizzas |
| sauna | saunas |
Words better known in the plural
Some words of foreign origin are much better known in the plural; usage of the original singular may be considered pedantic or actually incorrect or worse[12] by some speakers. Country to "Dominion of Canada" or "Canadian Federation" or anything else please read the Talk Page Alaska ( Аляска Alyaska) is a state in the United States of America, in the northwest of the North American continent Inuktitut ( Inuktitut syllabics: iu-Cans ᐃᓄᒃᑎᑐᑦ ( fonts required literally "like the Inuit") is the name of the varieties of In the English Language, Nouns are inflected for Grammatical number —that is singular or Plural. Welsh ( cy Cymraeg or cy y Gymraeg, kəmˈrɑːɨɡ and {{IPA|[ə ɡəmˈrɑːɨɡ]}}, is a member of the Brythonic branch of Celtic In common usage, the original plural is considered the singular form. In many cases, back-formation has produced a regularized plural. In Etymology, back-formation refers to the process of creating a new Lexeme (less precisely a new "word" by removing actual or supposed Affixes
| Original singular | Original plural/ common singular |
Common plural |
|---|---|---|
| thou | you | you |
| agendum | agenda7 | agendas |
| alga | algae | algae |
| biscotto | biscotti | biscotti |
| candelabrum | candelabra | candelabras |
| datum8 | data | data (mass noun) |
| graffito | graffiti | graffiti (mass noun) |
| insigne | insignia | insignias |
| opus | opera | operas |
| panino | panini | paninis (currently gaining use) |
| paparazzo | paparazzi | paparazzi |
Note 7: An agenda commonly is used to mean a list of agenda.
Note 8: A single piece of data is sometimes referred to as a data point. In engineering, drafting, surveying, and geodesy, and in weight and balance calculations for aircraft, a datum (plural datums or data) is a reference point, surface, or axis on an object or the earth’s surface against which measurements are made. The center-of-gravity (CG is the point at which an aircraft would balance if it were possible to suspend it at that point Debt AIDS Trade in Africa (or DATA) is a Multinational non-government organization founded in January 2002 in London by U2 's
Some plural nouns are used as such—invariably being accompanied by a plural verb form—while their singular forms are rarely encountered:
| nuptial | nuptials |
| phalanx9 | phalanges |
| tiding | tidings |
| victual | victuals |
| viscus | viscera |
Note 9: In medical terminology, a phalanx is any bone of the finger or toe. A military phalanx is pluralized phalanxes.
A related phenomenon is the confusion of a foreign plural for its singular form:
| criterion | criteria |
| phenomenon | phenomena |
| consortium | consortia |
| symposium | symposia |
Magazine was derived from Arabic via French. It was originally plural, but in English, it is always regarded as singular.
Plurals of numbers
English, like some other languages, treats large numerals as nouns (cf. "there were ten soldiers" and "there were a hundred soldiers"). Thus, dozens is preferred to tens, while hundreds and thousands are also completely acceptable.
Plurals of numbers differ according to how they are used. The following rules apply to dozen, score, hundred, thousand, million, and similar terms:
- When modified by a number, the plural is not inflected, that is, has no -s added. Hence one hundred, two hundred, etc. For vaguer large numbers, one may say several hundred or many hundreds.
- When used alone, or followed by a prepositional phrase, the plural is inflected: dozens of complaints, scores of people. An adpositional phrase is a Linguistics term that includes (a prepositional phrase(s (which are usually found in head-first languages like English) and However, either complaints by the dozen or complaints by the dozens is acceptable (although differing in meaning).
- The preposition of is used when speaking of nonspecific items identified by pronouns: two hundred of these, three dozen of those. The of is not used for a number of specific items: three hundred oriental rugs. However, if the pronoun is included with the specific item, the of is used: five million of those dollar bills.
Nouns used attributively
Nouns used attributively to qualify other nouns are generally in the singular, even though for example, a dog catcher catches more than one dog, and a department store has more than one department. This is true even for some binary nouns where the singular form is not found in isolation, such as trouser press or scissor kick. A plurale tantum (plural pluralia tantum) is a noun that appears only in the Plural form and does not have a singular variant though it may still refer It is also true where the attribute noun is itself qualified with a number, such as a twenty-dollar bill, a ten-foot pole or a two-man tent. The plural is used for pluralia tantum nouns; a glasses case is for eyeglasses, while a glass case is made of glass. A plurale tantum (plural pluralia tantum) is a noun that appears only in the Plural form and does not have a singular variant though it may still refer The plural may also be used to emphasise the plurality of the attribute, especially in British English: a careers advisor, a languages expert. British English or UK English ( BrE, BE, en-GB) is the broad term used to distinguish the forms of the English language used in the The plural is also more common with irregular plurals for certain attributions: women killers are women, whereas woman killers kill women.
Defective nouns
Some nouns have no singular form. Such a noun is called a plurale tantum (see also Words better known in the plural above):
- billiards, clothes, measles, thanks, vittles
Some of these do have singular adjective forms, such as billiard ball. A plurale tantum (plural pluralia tantum) is a noun that appears only in the Plural form and does not have a singular variant though it may still refer In addition, some are treated as singular in construction, e. g. , "billiards is a game played on a table with billiard balls and a cue", "measles is an infectious disease". Thanks is usually treated as plural.
A particular set of nouns, describing things having two parts, comprises the major group of pluralia tantum in modern English:
- pants, pliers, scissors, shorts, trousers, glasses (a pair of)
Note that these words are interchangeable with a pair of scissors, a pair of trousers, and so forth. In the U. S. fashion industry it is common to refer to a single pair of pants as a pant —though this is a back-formation, the English word (deriving from the French pantalon) was originally singular. In Etymology, back-formation refers to the process of creating a new Lexeme (less precisely a new "word" by removing actual or supposed Affixes In the same field, one half of a pair of scissors separated from the other half is, rather illogically, referred to as a half-scissor. Tweezers used to be part of this group, but tweezer has come into common usage since the second half of the twentieth century.
Mass nouns (or uncountable nouns) do not represent distinct objects, so the singular and plural semantics do not apply in the same way. In Linguistics, a mass noun (also uncountable noun or non-count noun) is a common Noun that presents entities as an unbounded mass Some examples:
- Abstract nouns
- goodness, idleness, honesty, deceit, freshness, bitterness, information, obscurity, wisdom, cunning
- Arts and sciences
- chemistry, geometry, surgery, mechanics, optics, blues,10 jazz, rock and roll, impressionism, surrealism
- Chemical elements and other physical entities:
- antimony, gold, oxygen, equipment, furniture, gear, species, air, water, sand, traffic
Note 10: Referring to the musical style as a whole.
Some mass nouns can be pluralized, but the meaning thereof may change slightly. For example, when I have two pieces of sand, I do not have two sands; I have sand. There is more sand in your pile, not more sands. However, there could be many “sands of Africa”—either many distinct stretches of sand, or distinct types of sand of interest to geologists or builders, or simply the allusive sands of Africa.
It is rare to pluralize furniture in this way. Nor would information be so treated, except in the case of criminal informations, which are prosecutor's briefs similar to indictments. In the Common law legal system an indictment (ɪnˈdaɪtmənt (in-DITE-mint is a formal accusation of having committed a criminal offense
There is only one class of atoms called oxygen, but there are several isotopes of oxygen, which might be referred to as different oxygens. In casual speech, oxygen might be used as shorthand for "oxygen atoms", but in this case, it is not a mass noun, so it is entirely sensible to refer to multiple oxygens in the same molecule.
One would interpret Bob's wisdoms as various pieces of Bob's wisdom (that is, don't run with scissors, defer to those with greater knowledge), deceits as a series of instances of deceitful behavior (lied on income tax, dated my wife), and the different idlenesses of the worker as plural distinct manifestations of the mass concept of idleness (or as different types of idleness, "bone lazy" versus "no work to do").
Specie and species make a fascinating case. Both words come from a Latin word meaning "kind", but they do not form a singular-plural pair; they are separate nouns. Coins, such as nickels, euros (see Linguistic issues concerning the euro), and cents are specie, but there is no plural. Several linguistic issues have arisen in relation to the spelling of the words Euro and cent in the many languages of the member states The idea is "payment in kind". Moreover, species, the "kinds of living things", is the same in singular and plural.
Plurals of compound nouns
The majority of English compound nouns have one basic term, or head, with which they end, and are pluralized in typical fashion:
| able seaman | able seamen |
| headbanger | headbangers |
| yellow-dog contract | yellow-dog contracts |
A compound that has one head, with which it begins, usually pluralizes its head:
| attorney general | attorneys general |
| bill of attainder | bills of attainder |
| court martial | courts martial |
| governor-general | governors-general |
| passerby | passersby |
| ship of the line | ships of the line |
| son-in-law | sons-in-law |
| minister-president | ministers-president |
| knight-errant | knights-errant |
| procurator fiscal (in Scotland) | procurators fiscal |
It is common in informal speech to instead pluralize the last word in the manner typical of most English nouns, but in edited prose, the forms given above are preferred. In Linguistics, a compound is a Lexeme (less precisely a Word) that consists of more than one stem. In linguistics the head is the word that determines the syntactic type of the Phrase of which it is a member or analogously the stem that determines the
If a compound can be thought to have two heads, both of them tend to be pluralized when the first head has an irregular plural form:
| man-child | men-children |
| manservant | menservants |
| woman doctor | women doctors |
Two-headed compounds in which the first head has a standard plural form, however, tend to pluralize only the final head:
| city-state | city-states |
| nurse-practitioner | nurse-practitioners |
| scholar-poet | scholar-poets |
In military usage, the term general, as part of an officer's title, is etymologically an adjective, but it has been adopted as a noun and thus a head, so compound titles employing it are pluralized at the end:
| brigadier general | brigadier generals |
| major general | major generals |
For compounds of three or more words that have a head (or a term functioning as a head) with an irregular plural form, only that term is pluralized:
| man-about-town | men-about-town |
| man-of-war | men-of-war |
| woman of the street | women of the street |
For many other compounds of three or more words with a head at the front—especially in cases where the compound is ad hoc and/or the head is metaphorical—it is generally regarded as acceptable to pluralize either the first major term or the last (if open when singular, such compounds tend to take hyphens when plural in the latter case):
| ham on rye | hams on rye/ham-on-ryes |
| jack-in-the-box | jacks-in-the-box/jack-in-the-boxes |
| jack-in-the-pulpit | jacks-in-the-pulpit/jack-in-the-pulpits |
With a few extended compounds, both terms may be pluralized—again, with an alternative (which may be more prevalent, e. g. , heads of state):
| head of state | heads of states/heads of state |
| son of a bitch | sons of bitches/son-of-a-bitches |
With extended compounds constructed around o', only the last term is pluralized (or left unchanged if it is already plural):
| cat-o'-nine-tails | cat-o'-nine-tails |
| jack-o'-lantern | jack-o'-lanterns |
| will-o'-the-wisp | will-o'-the-wisps |
Compounds from the French
Many English compounds have been borrowed directly from the French, and these generally follow a somewhat different set of rules. A loanword (or loan word) is a word directly taken into one Language from another with little or no translation French-loaned compounds with a head at the beginning tend to pluralize both words, according to French practice:
| agent provocateur | agents provocateurs |
| entente cordiale | ententes cordiales |
| fait accompli | faits accomplis |
| idée fixe | idées fixes |
For compounds adopted directly from the French where the head comes at the end, it is generally regarded as acceptable either to pluralize both words or only the last:
| beau geste | beaux gestes/beau gestes |
| belle époque | belles époques/belle époques |
| bon mot | bons mots/bon mots |
| bon vivant | bons vivants/bon vivants |
French-loaned compounds longer than two words tend to follow the rules of the original language, which usually involves pluralizing only the head at the beginning:
| aide-de-camp | aides-de-camp |
| cri de coeur | cris de coeur |
| coup d'état | coups d'état |
| tour de force | tours de force |
but:
| tête-à-tête | tête-à-têtes |
A distinctive case is the compound film noir. For this French-loaned artistic term, English-language texts variously use as the plural films noirs, films noir, and, most prevalently, film noirs. The 11th edition of the standard Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2006) lists film noirs as the preferred style. Three primary bases may be identified for this:
- Unlike other compounds borrowed directly from the French, film noir is used to refer primarily to English-language cultural artifacts; a typically English-style plural is thus unusually appropriate.
- Again, unlike other foreign-loaned compounds, film noir refers specifically to the products of popular culture; consequently, popular usage holds more orthographical authority than is usual.
- English has adopted noir as a stand-alone noun in artistic contexts, leading it to serve as the lone head in a variety of compounds (e. g. , psycho-noir, sci-fi noir).
See also the headless nouns section below.
Plurals (and singulars) of headless nouns
In The Language Instinct, linguist Steven Pinker discusses what he calls "headless words," typically bahuvrihi compounds, like lowlife and Red Sox, in which life and sox are not heads semantically; that is, a lowlife is not a type of life, nor are Red Sox a group of similarly colored socks. The Language Instinct is a book by Steven Pinker, published in 1994. Linguistics is the scientific study of Language, encompassing a number of sub-fields Steven Arthur Pinker (born September 18 1954 is a prominent Canadian - American experimental psychologist, cognitive scientist, and author A bahuvrīhí (बहुव्रीहि or bahuvrihi compound (also exocentric compound) is a type of nominal compound that refers to something that The Boston Red Sox are a Professional baseball team based in Boston Massachusetts, and are the reigning (2007 World Series Champions. In linguistics the head is the word that determines the syntactic type of the Phrase of which it is a member or analogously the stem that determines the When the common form of such a word is singular, it is treated as if it has a regular plural, even if the final constituent of the word is usually pluralized in a nonregular fashion. Thus, more than one lowlife are lowlifes, not "lowlives. " A related process can be observed with the compound maple leaf, pluralized in its common-noun form as maple leaves; when it is adopted as the name of an ice-hockey team, its plural becomes Maple Leafs. "Leafs" and "Maple Leafs" redirect here For the former American Hockey League team see St Other examples include:
| flatfoot | flatfoots |
| sabertooth | sabertooths |
| still life | still lifes |
| tenderfoot | tenderfoots |
An exception is Blackfoot, of which the plural can be Blackfeet, though that form of the name is officially rejected by the Blackfoot First Nations of Canada. The Blackfoot Confederacy or Niitsítapi (meaning "original people" c First Nations is a term of Ethnicity that refers to the Aboriginal peoples in Canada who are neither Inuit nor Métis people
Where words have taken on completely new meanings, irregular plurals may become regularized. Antennas is the accepted plural of antenna when it refers to electronic equipment, in contrast to antennae for arthropod feelers. An antenna is a Transducer designed to transmit or Receive electromagnetic waves In other words antennas convert electromagnetic waves into Antennae (singular antenna) are paired Appendages connected to the front-most segments of Arthropods In Crustaceans they are The computer mouse is sometimes considered headless and pluralized as mouses, but also often as mice; in contrast to the compound headless words just discussed, there is a considerably stronger metaphorical relationship in this case, with many computer pointing devices resembling rodents with tails. In Computing, a mouse (plural mice, mouse devices, or mouses) Metaphor (from the Greek: μεταφορά - metaphora, meaning "transfer" is language that directly compares seemingly unrelated subjects
In other cases, the common form of a headless word is a nonregular plural; when such a word lacks a terminal s, it is treated as defective, thus making the singular version of the word identical: an individual member of the Boston baseball team is a Red Sox, just as all twenty-five are; one Chicago White Sox is a White Sox. The Chicago White Sox are a professional Baseball team based in Chicago, Illinois.
Related collective nouns
Sports team names like those discussed above—as well as more grammatically ordinary names such as Reds, Knicks, and Canadiens, and straightforward compound names such as Blue Jays—form a particular set of collective nouns. The Cincinnati Reds are a Major League Baseball team based in Cincinnati Ohio, USA The Montreal Canadiens (Les Canadiens de Montréal are a professional Ice hockey team based in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The Toronto Blue Jays are a professional baseball team based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. In Linguistics, a collective noun is a word used to define a group of objects where "objects" can be People, Animals Inanimate things Closely related to the class of essentially plural headless nouns typified by Red Sox are the growing number of orthographically singular sports team names that may be classified as examples of a special type of collective noun—one that (a) has identical terms for both the collective and an individual thereof (as with the essentially plural headless noun) but (b) is not used as a counting noun beyond the singular. Two examples include the name of the Miami NBA team—Heat—and the name of the Colorado NHL team—Avalanche. The Miami Heat (often referred to simply as the Heat, including in some official team publications with HEAT in all capital letters are a professional Basketball The Colorado Avalanche are a professional Ice hockey team based in Denver Colorado, United States While heat is a mass noun, whereas avalanche is a normal counting noun, in the context of a team name, both words operate as this special type of collective noun. Just as with the Sox, any one of the twelve current members of Miami's pro basketball squad is a Heat; similarly, any individual member of the Colorado Avalanche is an Avalanche. However, where one may say, for instance, that "two Red Sox struck out" or "four White Sox homered," the equivalent term is invariably used as an adjective when referring to multiple players of one of the teams named in this increasingly popular way: "two Heat players fought" or "four Avalanche players scored" (Avalanche followers have a little more flexibility, with "Avs" as the team's unofficial, but widely used nickname). Other examples include:
Note that in not every case above is it certain that the name is ever used in its noun form to refer to anything but the collective—i. The Tampa Bay Lightning is a professional ice hockey team based in Tampa Florida. The Indiana Fever is a professional women's Basketball team that plays in the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA The Minnesota Wild are a professional Ice hockey team based in Saint Paul Minnesota. The New York Liberty is a Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA team based in New York City. The Minnesota Lynx are a Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA team based in Minneapolis Minnesota and play their home games at the Target Center The Utah Jazz is a professional Basketball team based in Salt Lake City, Utah. The Phoenix Mercury is a Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA team based in Phoenix Arizona and the current WNBA champions The Orlando Magic is a professional Basketball team based in Orlando Florida. The Detroit Shock is a Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA team based in Detroit Michigan. The Chicago Sky are a Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA team based in Chicago Illinois. The Columbus Crew is a professional soccer club based in Columbus Ohio that participates in Major League Soccer. The Charlotte Sting was once a Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA franchise based in Charlotte North Carolina and it was one of the league's eight Houston Dynamo is an American professional soccer team based in Houston, Texas, United States. The Seattle Storm is a Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA team based in Seattle Washington. The Connecticut Sun are a Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA team based in Uncasville Connecticut. Los Angeles Galaxy (aka LA Galaxy) is an American soccer club based in Los Angeles California. The New England Revolution, nicknamed the Revs, is a professional soccer club based in Foxborough Massachusetts, that participates in Major League Port Adelaide Football Club, often referred to as simply Port or the Power is an Australian rules football club based in Adelaide, South Australia DC United is a professional soccer club located in Washington D e. , not even to an individual player; in other cases, it is possible that the name is sometimes used in its noun form (with or without a terminal s appended) to refer to multiple players, short of the whole collective.
An exceptional case is that of the St. Louis Blues hockey team. The St Louis Blues are a professional Ice hockey team based in St The club is named after the song "St. Louis Blues," which makes the team name Blues an irregularly pluralized word to begin with—one whose plural is identical to its singular. " St Louis Blues " is an American popular Song composed by William Christopher Handy in the Blues style By this reckoning, then, an individual team member would also be a "Blues. " However, because the name is spelled like a regular plural, its use as a collective noun leads to a process of back-formation, with the result that a single player on the team is known as a Blue. In Etymology, back-formation refers to the process of creating a new Lexeme (less precisely a new "word" by removing actual or supposed Affixes The club name's distinctive orthographical nature further allows it to be used freely as a counting noun, so that one may speak of, for instance, "two Blues in the penalty box. "
Pinker discusses a case that could be construed as opposite, that of the Florida Marlins baseball team. The Florida Marlins are a professional baseball team based in Miami Gardens Florida. Describing how the issue was raised by talk show host David Letterman, Pinker asks, Why is the name Marlins "given that those fish are referred to in the plural as marlin?" An analogous question could be asked about the Maple Leafs. David Michael Letterman (born April 12, 1947) is an American late-night Talk show host and Comedian and the host since 1993 Pinker's answer comes down to this: "A name is not the same thing as a noun. "[13] Consequently, names (and nouns that derive from names) based on nouns with irregular plurals do not acquire them—though, as we see with Red Sox, new irregularities may arise.
Nouns with multiple plurals
Some nouns have two plurals, one used to refer to a number of things considered individually, the other to refer to a number of things collectively. In some cases, one of the two is nowadays archaic or dialectal.
| brother | brothers | brethren11 |
| cannon | cannons | cannon |
| child | children | childer12 |
| cloth | cloths | clothes13 |
| cow | cows | kine14 |
| die | dice | dies15 |
| fish | fish | fishes16 |
| iris (plant) | iris | irises17 |
| penny | pennies | pence18 19 |
| person | persons | people20 |
| pig | pigs | swine |
| sow | sows | swine |
Note 11: Brethren refer to members of a monastic order, while brothers are family members and related by blood. Monasticism (from Greek μοναχός, monachos, derived from Greek monos, alone is the religious practice in which one
Note 12: Childer has all but disappeared, but can still be seen in Childermas (Innocents' Day).
Note 13: Clothes refers collectively to all of a household's washable cloth articles, but is now used almost exclusively of garments.
Note 14: Kine is still used in some rural English dialects.
Note 15: Dies is used as the plural for die in the sense of a mould; dice as the plural (and increasingly as the singular) in the sense of a small random number generator. For other uses see either Die or Dice (disambiguation. Dice (the Plural of Die, from Old French Dice is also the accepted plural form of die in the semiconductor industry.
Note 16: Fish: the plural for one species of fish, or caught fish, is fish, but for live fish of many species, in poetic usage, and in some dialects fishes is used.
Note 17: For multiple plants, iris is used, but irises is used for multiple blossoms.
Note 18: If you have several (British) one-penny pieces you have several pennies. Pence is used for an amount of money, which can be made up of a number of coins of different denominations: one penny and one five-penny piece are together worth six pence. The suffixed minor currency unit of 'p' (/pi/) is often vocalised, where such small divisions of currency are discussed in common speech, and used for both the singular and the 'amount plural', but 'number plurals' build upon the base values and any omission of the unit shifts the plural to the coin's numerator (e. g. "I have a one /pi/ and three twenty /piz/ and two fifties in my pocket. I cannot believe I only have one pound, sixty-one /pi/ left after last night. The Pound Sterling ( symbol £; ISO code: GBP) subdivided into 100 pence (singular penny) is the Currency "). In written speech, a number of coins might be "two 10ps", although those that prefer to use apostrophes for initialisms may decide to use the "two 10p's" variant.
Note 19: Penny and pennies also refer to one or more U. S. one-cent pieces, though in American usage, a nickel is worth five cents, not five pence.
Note 20: The word people is usually treated as the suppletive plural of person (one person, many people). In Linguistics and Etymology, suppletion is traditionally understood as the use of one word as the inflected form of another word when the two words However, in legal and other formal contexts, the plural of person is persons; furthermore, people can also be a singular noun with its own plural (for example, "We are many persons, from many peoples").
Plurals of symbols and initialisms
Individual letters and abbreviations whose plural would be ambiguous if only an -s were added are pluralized by adding -'s.
- mind your p's and q's
- A. A. 's and B. A. 's
- the note had three PS's
Opinion is divided on whether to extend this use of the apostrophe to related but nonambiguous cases, such as the plurals of numerals (e. g. , 1990's vs. 1990s) and words used as terms (e. g. , "his writing uses a lot of but's" vs. "his writing uses a lot of buts"). Some writers favor the use of the apostrophe as consistent with its application in ambiguous cases; others say it confuses the plural with the possessive -'s and should be avoided whenever possible in pluralization, a view with which The Chicago Manual of Style concurs. The possessive case of a language is a Grammatical case used to indicate a relationship of possession.
English and many other European languages form the plural of a one-letter abbreviation by doubling it: p. ("page"), pp. ("pages"); l. ("line"), ll. ("lines"). These abbreviations are used in literary work, such as footnotes and bibliographies.
Acronyms are initialisms used as if they are words. Acronyms, initialisms, and alphabetisms are Abbreviations that are formed using the initial components in a phrase or name Acronyms, initialisms, and alphabetisms are Abbreviations that are formed using the initial components in a phrase or name Clearly, it is not desirable to pluralize the acronym laser as laser's. Thus, the most consistent approach for pluralizing acronyms is to simply add a lowercase -s as a suffix. This works well even for acronyms ending with an s, as with CASs (pronounced "kazzes"), while still making it possible to use the possessive form (-'s) for acronyms without confusion. The traditional style of pluralizing single letters with -'s was naturally extended to acronyms when they were commonly written with periods. This form is still preferred by some people for all initialisms and thus -'s as a suffix is often seen in informal usage.
Plural to singular by back-formation
Some words have unusually formed singulars and plurals, but develop "normal" singular-plural pairs by back-formation. In Etymology, back-formation refers to the process of creating a new Lexeme (less precisely a new "word" by removing actual or supposed Affixes For example, pease (modern peas) was in origin a singular with plural peasen. However, pease came to be analysed as plural by analogy, from which a new singular pea was formed; the spelling of pease was also altered accordingly. Similarly, termites and primates were the three-syllable plurals of termes and primas; these singulars were lost, however, and the plural forms reduced to two syllables. Syringe is a back-formation from syringes, itself the plural of syrinx, a musical instrument. In classical mythology Syrinx ( Greek Συριγξ was a Nymph and a follower of Artemis, known for her chastity Cherry is from Norman French cherise. Norman is a Romance language and one of the Oïl languages. The northern Norman can be classified in the septentrional Oil languages with Picard and Finally, phases was once the plural of phasis, but the singular is now phase.
Kudos is a singular Greek word meaning praise, but is often taken to be a plural. At present, however, kudo is considered an error, though the usage is becoming more common as kudos becomes better known. The name of the Greek sandwich style gyros is, increasingly, undergoing a similar transformation. This article is about the food dish For other uses see Gyro. Gyros or gyro (giros (ˈjɪəroʊ or /ˈdʒaɪroʊ/ Greek: γύρος
The singular form of Spanish tamales (pronounced [taˈmales]) is tamal ([taˈmal]). A tamale ( Spanish tamal, from Nahuatl tamalli) is a traditional indigenous American food consisting of steam-cooked corn The anglicized version of tamales is pronounced /təˈmɑːliːz/ and the back-formed singular is tamale /təˈmɑːliː/).
The term, from Latin, for the main upper arm flexor in the singular is the "biceps muscle" (from "biceps brachii"); however, many English speakers take it to be a plural and refer to the muscle of only one arm, by back-formation, as "a biceps". In Human anatomy, the biceps brachii is a Muscle located on the upper Arm. The correct—although very seldom used—Latin plural would be bicipites.
The word "sastrugi" (hard ridges on deep snow) is of Russian origin and its singular is "sastruga"; but the analogical Latin-type singular "sastrugus" has sometimes been used. Sastrugi or zastrugi are sharp irregular grooves or ridges formed on a snow surface by wind Erosion and deposition, and found in polar and temperate snow
Plurals of names of peoples
There are several different rules for this.
In discussing peoples whose demonym takes -man or -woman, there are three options: pluralize to -men or -women if referring to individuals, and use the root alone if referring to the whole nation, or add people. A demonym or gentilic is a word that denotes the members of a People or the inhabitants of a place
| Dutchman Dutchwoman |
Dutchmen Dutchwomen |
the Dutch |
| Englishman Englishwoman |
Englishmen Englishwomen |
the English |
| Frenchman Frenchwoman |
Frenchmen Frenchwomen |
the French |
| Irishman Irishwoman |
Irishmen Irishwomen |
the Irish |
| Scotsman Scotswoman |
Scotsmen Scotswomen |
the Scots |
| Welshman Welshwoman |
Welshmen Welshwomen |
the Welsh |
One can say "a Scots(wo)man" or "a Scot", "Scots(wo)men", "Scottish people", or "Scots," and "the Scottish" or "the Scots". (Scotch is considered old fashioned. )
Several peoples have names that are simple nouns and can be pluralized by the addition of either -s or -ish (the later case often calls for the elimination of terminal letters so the pluralizing suffix can be connected directly with the last consonant of the root):
| Dane | Danes | the Danes the Danish |
| Finn | Finns | the Finns the Finnish |
| Spaniard | Spaniards | the Spaniards the Spanish (much more common) |
| Swede | Swedes | the Swedes the Swedish |
Names of peoples that end in -ese take no plural:
| Chinese | Chinese Chinese people |
the Chinese |
| Japanese | Japanese Japanese people |
the Japanese |
Other names of peoples that have no plural form include Swiss and Québécois.
Most names for Native Americans are not pluralized:
- Blood
- Hopi
- Iroquois
- Mi'kmaq
- Ojibwa
- Sioux
Some exceptions include Algonquins, Aztecs, Chippewas, Crees, Hurons, Mohawks, and Oneidas. Note also the following words borrowed from Inuktitut:
| Inuk | Inuit |
| Iqalummiuq | Iqalummiut ("inhabitant of Iqaluit") |
| Nunavimmiuq | Nunavimmiut ("inhabitant of Nunavik") |
| Nunavummiuq | Nunavummiut ("inhabitant of Nunavut") |
Names of most other peoples of the world are pluralized using the normal English rules. Inuktitut ( Inuktitut syllabics: iu-Cans ᐃᓄᒃᑎᑐᑦ ( fonts required literally "like the Inuit") is the name of the varieties of Iqaluit (iqaluit ᐃᖃᓗᐃᑦ in Inuktitut syllabics; often pronounced ɨˈkæljuːɨt in English is the territorial Nunavik (ᓄᓇᕕᒃ comprises the northern third of the province of Quebec, Canada. Nunavut (ˈnuːnəvʊt ( Inuktitut syllabics: ᓄᓇᕗᑦ is the largest and newest territory of Canada; it was separated officially from the
Discretionary plurals
A number of words like army, company, crowd, fleet, government, majority, mess, number, pack, and party may refer either to a single entity or the members of the set that compose it. In Linguistics, a collective noun is a word used to define a group of objects where "objects" can be People, Animals Inanimate things Thus, as H. W. Fowler describes, in British English they are "treated as singular or plural at discretion"; Fowler notes that occasionally a "delicate distinction" is made possible by discretionary plurals: "The Cabinet is divided is better, because in the order of thought a whole must precede division; and The Cabinet are agreed is better, because it takes two or more to agree. Henry Watson Fowler ( 10 March 1858 – 26 December 1933) was an English schoolmaster Lexicographer and commentator British English or UK English ( BrE, BE, en-GB) is the broad term used to distinguish the forms of the English language used in the "[14] Also in British English, names of towns and countries take plural verbs when they refer to sports teams but singular verbs when they refer to the actual place: England are playing Germany tonight refers to a football game, but England is the most populous country of the United Kingdom refers to the country. The English national football team represents England in international football and is controlled by The Football Association, the governing body for football The German national football team (Die deutsche Fußballnationalmannschaft From 1950 to 1990 the team was also informally called West Germany in English as since Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a Team sport played between two teams of eleven players and is widely considered In North American English, such words are invariably treated as singular. North American English is a collective term used for the varieties of the English language that are spoken in North America, namely in the United States
Snob plurals
Another type of irregular plural occurs in the register of the English upper classes in the context of field sports, where the singular form is used in place of the plural, as in "two lion" or "five pheasant". Eric Partridge refers to these as "snob plurals" and conjectures that they may have developed by analogy with the common English irregular plural animal words "deer", "sheep" and "trout". Eric Honeywood Partridge ( February 6, 1894 – June 1, 1979) was a noted New Zealand / British lexicographer of [15]
The term snob plurals can be applied more generally to uses of forms of pluralization characterized, first, by their departure from the standard English rule of adding -(e)s, and, second, by the likelihood they are being so used to enhance the status of the speaker. While speaking to a group of monolingual Anglophone friends, someone talking about a recent trip to Russia who says, "We visited five oblasti," is most likely using a snob plural. Latinate plurals for nouns of Greek origin mentioned earlier in this article are often employed as snob plurals— cacti, for example, or hippopotami—although for substantial numbers of speakers, they are simply the unmarked usages. Markedness is a linguistic concept that developed out of the Prague School (also known as the Prague linguistic circle) The use of nonstandard plurals can be one convenient way to communicate the claim that the speaker has a certain level of knowledge associated with sophistication and, more generally, prestige. Because the pragmatics of this usage are heavily dependent on context, it is impossible to say that a particular use of pluralization is, or is not, a snob plural in the absence of situational information. Pragmatics is the study of the ability of Natural language speakers to communicate more than that which is explicitly stated Someone speaking at an academic conference to fellow Slavicists might use oblasti without the expectation of enhanced social status and, therefore, not be using a snob plural (on the other hand, the speaker might fear a loss of social status for using oblasts). Articles in encyclopediae are, overall, written for the general reader and avoid forms of plural that would likely confuse those not already familiar with the topic.
References
- ^ English Irregular Plural Nouns
- ^ UNIT S4: YS OR IES?
- ^ Mary Fulbrook, The Two Germanies. 1945-1990 (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1996)
- ^ Henry Ashby Turner, The two Germanies since 1945 (New Haven: Yale UP, 1987)
- ^ Entry for "money" in dictionary.com
- ^ E. g. Collins English Dictionary, 6th ed. (Glasgow: HarperCollins, 2003).
- ^ "Sometimes scientists think of data as plural, as in These data do not support the conclusions. But more often scientists and researchers think of data as a singular mass entity like information, and most people now follow this in general usage. "[1]
- ^ ". . . of the 136 distinguished consultants on usage polled for the 1975 Harper Dictionary of Contemporary Usage, 49% responded that they use "The data is. . . " in writing. And in casual speech, 65% use data as singular. Those who defend "The data is. . . " often point to the fact that agenda is also, strictly, a plural, but is nearly always regarded as a single list and takes a singular verb. You'll probably never hear anyone ask: "Are the agenda interesting?"[2]
- ^ Summary of dictionary sources and scholarly usage [3]
- ^ New Oxford Dictionary of English, 1999
- ^ ". . . in educated everyday usage as represented by the Guardian newspaper, it is nowadays most often used as a singular. "[4]
- ^ "The word agenda, for example, was originally plural (from agendum: 'something to be acted on') but is nowadays used only as a singular, and nobody in their right mind would insist that it should be used as a plural. "[5]
- ^ Pinker, Stephen, The Language Instinct: How the Mind Creates Language (New York: Perennial, 2000 [1994]), 139.
- ^ Fowler, H. W. , A Dictionary of Modern English Usage, 2nd ed. A Dictionary of Modern English Usage, often referred to as Fowler's Modern English Usage or simply as Fowler's or Fowler , revised by Sir Ernest Gowers (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1965), 403. Sir Ernest Arthur Gowers GCB GBE ( 2 June[[ 880]]– 16 April 1966) was a British Civil servant, now best known for work on
- ^ Partridge, Eric, Usage and Abusage: A Guide to Good English, revised by Janet Whitcut (New York and London: W. W. Norton, 1997), pp. 238–39.
See also
External links
- Rules for Irregular Plural Formation of Nouns summary by Pat Byrd, Department of Applied Linguistics & ESL, Georgia State University
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