Plurals
Just a few random musings on the workings of the language...
English is a rather strange language. In most other languages there are only a couple of general ways of forming plural nouns. In English, however, there are an awful lot of ways and a lot of exceptions.
For example, the most common is adding -s
Some nouns use -es after a sibilant (e.g., "passes") and sometimes after an "o" ("heroes", "volcanoes", but not "pianos" which is derived from Romance languages)
Not, of course, 's, as beloved by many greengrocers...
Cherry and lorry use "-ies", whereas boy and day use the regualr "-s"
Then of course, there are the nouns that don't change at all in the plural, e.g., sheep, deer, cod, fish, mackeral, and those which only exist as a plural (staff). There are also some from the Latin - series, species, etc.
"Woman" and "man" change their last vowel to an "e", goose, foot and tooth changes both to "ee".
Ox and child take their cue from pre-Norman linguistics and still use the archaic -en or -ren. Brother can be made into brothers or brethren.
Wolf and half become wolves and halves. Mouth and house change their pronunciation on becoming plural, while moth does not. Hoof can becomes hooves or hoofs.
Mouse and louse become mice and lice, where house does not.
From the Latin, we have formula becoming formulae, terminus becomign termini, stratum and media becoming media and strata, index becoming indices, thesis becoming theses.
Axes is the plural of both axis and axe, but is pronounced differently in each case.
If terminus becomes termini, then do you wait all day for a bus but several bi turn up at once? Are your tooths attached to your ga? If I had two, would I be talking out of my ba?
Radius to radii, corpus to corpora, viscus to viscera, stigma to stigmata (from the Greek), chateau to chateaux, cherub to cherubim.
The following are actually plurals: graffiti, opera, agenda, panini, paparazzi, data, insignia.
The following have no meaningful singular: clothes, measles, billiards, scissors, pants.
I won't even start about compound nouns (Attorneys General).
English is a rather strange language. In most other languages there are only a couple of general ways of forming plural nouns. In English, however, there are an awful lot of ways and a lot of exceptions.
For example, the most common is adding -s
Some nouns use -es after a sibilant (e.g., "passes") and sometimes after an "o" ("heroes", "volcanoes", but not "pianos" which is derived from Romance languages)
Not, of course, 's, as beloved by many greengrocers...
Cherry and lorry use "-ies", whereas boy and day use the regualr "-s"
Then of course, there are the nouns that don't change at all in the plural, e.g., sheep, deer, cod, fish, mackeral, and those which only exist as a plural (staff). There are also some from the Latin - series, species, etc.
"Woman" and "man" change their last vowel to an "e", goose, foot and tooth changes both to "ee".
Ox and child take their cue from pre-Norman linguistics and still use the archaic -en or -ren. Brother can be made into brothers or brethren.
Wolf and half become wolves and halves. Mouth and house change their pronunciation on becoming plural, while moth does not. Hoof can becomes hooves or hoofs.
Mouse and louse become mice and lice, where house does not.
From the Latin, we have formula becoming formulae, terminus becomign termini, stratum and media becoming media and strata, index becoming indices, thesis becoming theses.
Axes is the plural of both axis and axe, but is pronounced differently in each case.
If terminus becomes termini, then do you wait all day for a bus but several bi turn up at once? Are your tooths attached to your ga? If I had two, would I be talking out of my ba?
Radius to radii, corpus to corpora, viscus to viscera, stigma to stigmata (from the Greek), chateau to chateaux, cherub to cherubim.
The following are actually plurals: graffiti, opera, agenda, panini, paparazzi, data, insignia.
The following have no meaningful singular: clothes, measles, billiards, scissors, pants.
I won't even start about compound nouns (Attorneys General).
posted by Jonathan | Thursday, May 11, 2006
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