Plural form of the word spokesperson

Beverly   Monday, May 09, 2005, 13:11 GMT
What would be the plural tense for "spokesperson"
Antepolleo   Monday, May 09, 2005, 14:27 GMT
I'm not sure if it's grammatically correct, but as a native speaker I'd say the most natural sounding plural would be 'spokespeople'.
JJM   Monday, May 09, 2005, 16:13 GMT
"spokespersons"

Psst - it's not a "tense" (that's for verbs), it's a "form."
Lazar   Monday, May 09, 2005, 19:52 GMT
I agree with JJM - I think "spokespersons" sounds better than "spokespeople".
Antepolleo   Monday, May 09, 2005, 21:28 GMT
Bah, I've been outnumbered. Now you're causing me to second-guess myself... spokespersons sounds a little better now that I think about it. Although you wouldn't get strange looks for using either.
Travis   Monday, May 09, 2005, 21:33 GMT
I myself would probably as well go with "spokespersons", as "people" is generally used to refer to multiple individuals as a mass group, rather than as a plural number of individual persons.
mjd   Monday, May 09, 2005, 23:17 GMT
Either one sounds okay to me. "Spokespersons" sounds more like something that would appear in an official document of some kind, whereas "spokespeople" might slide off the tongue a little easier in informal speech.
Jonas CSG   Tuesday, May 10, 2005, 00:24 GMT
I think either one is acceptable. I think I use "spokespeople" but "spokespersons" sounds acceptable to me as well.
Jim   Tuesday, May 10, 2005, 03:42 GMT
"Spokesmen" but if you really do think that's sexist, well, I'd go for "spokespeople" except in some official/formal/legal contexts where a distinction is made along the lines that Travis indicated between persons and people. Though, Travis, you seem to suggest that this distinction is one that is generally made. To me "persons" (and therefore "spokespersons") would sound very awkward in informal everyday speech or writing (unless there was some reason to emphasise this distinction).
Travis   Tuesday, May 10, 2005, 03:59 GMT
The main thing is that while the two generally mean the same thing, they have different shades of meaning. And yes, "spokespersons" is more formal/official than "spokespeople" is. I would use both, depending on the manner in which they are being used, "spokespeople" for the general sense of multiple spokespersons in a collective fashion, and "spokespersons" in the sense of multiple instances of spokepersons.
Travis   Tuesday, May 10, 2005, 04:01 GMT
Mind you that the word "spokesperson" is rather formal/official in the first place...
Inigo   Wednesday, May 11, 2005, 08:38 GMT
Spokesmen.
muster   Wednesday, May 11, 2005, 08:46 GMT
spaceman it sounds more pronounce
JJM   Wednesday, May 11, 2005, 08:48 GMT
I's not a question of whether we like "spokespersons" or not (personally, I prefer to "humanize" such positions by using "spokesmen" or "spokeswomen"), it's simply a reality: "spokespersons" is the term in use these days.
muster   Wednesday, May 11, 2005, 09:19 GMT
as you've said it's simply a reality, but it has much more to take an acount for some business terms they consider spokepersons as 'representative or representator' of ones firm.