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Pedants' corner
Original poster

Campaign for etymologically correct plurals and singulars?

63 replies

asicsgirl · 01/05/2008 14:10

I just found myself in a cafe physically unable to order 'a panini'. Usually I get round this by ordering something else, but today I ordered a panino! And was proud...

I know that loan words become Anglicised and lose their 'foreign' characteristics over time (e.g. 'forums' is more common now than 'fora' and there are many other examples), but some of the more recent additions to English (like 'panini') seem to be missing out on their rightful stage of being inflected as they are in the mother tongue.

Someone wrote in to the Guardian a while ago about how pleased they were to hear a guy in a newsagent ask for 'two Magna'. My kind of chap...

Anyone with me?

OP posts:
tearinghairout · 02/05/2008 21:15

I love you all. I tell my bemused dch that we're having pizze. I get a look back from them that shows real pity.

moondog · 02/05/2008 21:17

Data 'are' is all we say on my MSc course.

tearinghairout · 02/05/2008 21:20

Ah, data... you can hardly say 'datum is' so what's the solution then? I've come up against this before. Let's have definative, someone.

berolina · 02/05/2008 21:20

German is good on this. Possibly too good. Data, spaghetti and hair are all plural.

tearinghairout · 02/05/2008 21:21

And I also tell 'em about a piece of graffito. They swear I'm wrong on that but one day they'll realise...

moondog · 02/05/2008 21:21

Welsh uses a different word for hair on head and hair on body. So does French come to think of it...
Does German?

berolina · 02/05/2008 21:22

Nope - it's all Haare.
It's very insidious. I'm always saying things like 'My hair's a mess, I must have them cut'.

Sanguine · 02/05/2008 22:53

So - to test if one's pasta is cooked, does one extract a spaghetto from the pan to throw at the wall?? I suppose one does.

Original poster
asicsgirl · 03/05/2008 05:21

You're all cheering me up greatly. Re. a piece of... well it would be a graffito, or a piece of graffiti, wouldn't it? A spaghetto, a piece of spaghetti... a datum, a piece of data...

On the subject of data, this is one that proof readers love to jump on. It is plural so it has to be 'the data show that...' and not 'shows that...'. But 'datum' does sound impossibly poncetastic doesn't it (to borrow Iklboo's term). I think people sometimes get around this by talking about one piece of data as a 'data point'???

ROFL at broccolus, btw

OP posts:
midnightexpress · 03/05/2008 09:19

05.21 asicsgirl?? You are way too involved in this. Seek help.

However, I'm not sure about that 'piece of data' - it's not uncountable is it? So in the same way that you wouldn't say 'a piece of peas' but 'a pea' or 'some peas' it should surely be 'a datum' or 'some data'. Or am I talking out of my arse?

Original poster
asicsgirl · 03/05/2008 18:44

Hee hee midnightexpress. If only it was just plurals that kept me awake at night...

Yeah, you're right about the count/ non-count noun thing. Seems to me that some loan words were 'count' nouns in the original language, but become more non-count-like in English. I think confusion like 'the data show...' is because 'data' on its way to becoming a non-count noun. So it becomes more natural to say 'a piece of data' or 'a piece of spaghetti', as we would say 'a piece of bread'.

Piece of panini, anyone?

OP posts:
JackieNo · 04/05/2008 17:19

I thought of this thread today as I asked for 'two cappucinos please' - was tempted to say cappucini, but decided I'd sound like a nob (or is that a knob?).

Original poster
asicsgirl · 05/05/2008 05:39

I'm never sure about the nob/ knob thing either. New thread needed?

Next time you're in a caff JackieNo... go on, I dare you. Your fellow pedants are right behind you

OP posts:
Sanguine · 05/05/2008 13:54

I'm doing a spot of studying today. I have reached a module all about the Data Protection Act. Oh, the fun I am having with my etymologically correct plurals!

WendyWeber · 05/05/2008 14:26
Original poster
asicsgirl · 05/05/2008 14:27

ROFL at hoodla.

One hoodo, two hoodi?

OP posts:
WendyWeber · 05/05/2008 14:32

Hoodla is great, isn't it

Sanguine · 05/05/2008 15:01

ROFL... hoodla!

Moosma · 07/05/2008 11:43

Is the plural of fanjo fanji?

AllFallDown · 07/05/2008 17:56

Perfectly acceptable, when using words of Latin derivation that have passed into English, to use an English rather than Latin plural. Which is why we usually hear stadiums, forums and so on, rather than stadia and fora. English is a constantly evolving language, and to insist that we use the forms of 2000 years ago moves beyond pedantry into snobbery. The point of language is to communicate clearly: Latinate plurals are no longer terribly useful for that. And I'm a pedant: I once infuriated a boss who criticised my "pedanticism" by saying, "I think you mean pedantry."

Califrau · 07/05/2008 18:09

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

BroccoliSpears · 07/05/2008 18:15
Original poster
asicsgirl · 08/05/2008 10:07

LOL at pronunciation of carAmel, califrau. Getting your own back for all those weird American pronunciations of actors' names in film trailers?

DeMI Moore...
Cate BlanCHETT...

OP posts:
BellaBear · 08/05/2008 10:10

DH says the plural of octopus is octopodes (and platypus, platypodes), is he right?

Sanguine · 09/05/2008 10:33

See site here:

www.askoxford.com/asktheexperts/faq/aboutgrammar/plurals

You wait for hours, then three omnibi come along at once...