Wordy people- Alumni in the singular????

8 replies

lucy5 · 27/02/2006 22:36

Im writing an obituary and want to say dh's father was an alumni[?] alumna [?] something else [?] of St. Peter's College Oxford.

Help!

OP posts:

snafu · 27/02/2006 22:36

Alumnus

Original poster

lucy5 · 27/02/2006 22:50

Thank you.

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zippitippitoes · 27/02/2006 23:03

alternatively you could refer to St Peter's as his alma mater

Original poster

lucy5 · 27/02/2006 23:04

Sorry for being dense Zippi, could you explain?

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zippitippitoes · 27/02/2006 23:10

it is used in a semi formal way to describe your school or university

it actually means nourishing mother/bountiful mother etc

so I think referring to an individual's college/university you would refer to it as his alma mater

but if the university was listing famous students they would have a list of

alumni

Original poster

lucy5 · 27/02/2006 23:18

Thank you, I worked out the mother bit, couldn't work out the rest, might save that one for The Telegraph. So do you think I should use alumni or alumnus?

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zippitippitoes · 27/02/2006 23:20

alumnus is the singular

Original poster

lucy5 · 27/02/2006 23:22

Thanks just wanted to double check as obviously I need it to be right.

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Flip