I'd like to know how the plural is handled in your language and if you know why. I guess there are many ways to express the plural and some could share the same way.
Thanks.
Thanks.
How does plural work in your language ?
Well, let's see:
My mother tongue is Spanish. Spanish is a romance language derived from vulgar latin, so it's an Indo-European language in the 'CEMTUM' group.
In Latin, pluralisation and inflection in general depended on cases and words endings. It was quite complex. Nowadays, most Romance languages have forgotten cases and now use a different type of declensions, and we use lots of prepositions, and other things that didn't exist in latin. However some other romance languages still preserve some remants of the Latin case system.
OK, back to Spanish now. What we do is just to add an 's' to most female or male nouns. E.g.:
perro (dog) --> perros (dogs)
computadora (computer) --> computadoras (computers)
silla (chair) --> sillas (chairs)
hijo (son or child) --> hijos (sons or children)
When the noun ends in consonant we add 'es'. E.g.:
Árbol (tree) --> Árboles (trees)
celular (mobile phone) --> celulares (mobile phones)
sartén (pan) --> sartenes
pan (bread) --> panes (some pieces of bread)
When the noun ends in 'z' we change 'z' for 'c' and add 'es' as usual. E.g.:
Alcatraz (gannet or booby) --> Alcatraces (Gannets or boobies)
Matraz --> Matraces (sorry I don't know this one in English, but it's a little container usually made of transparent glass used for chemical reactions)
There's also something like English 'uncountable' nouns in Spanish. And it follows more or less the same criteria. E.g.:
agua (water) .- you can't usually say 'aguas' (waters), unless talking about the sea or in a literary context.
vino (wine) .- when talking about a quantity you can't say 'vinos', but you can say so when talking about different types produced in a place.
rice (arroz) .- You never say 'arroces', there's no English equivalent either.
OK, that's more or less what comes to my mind right now. I hope it was helpful.
Kind regards
Pete from Peru
My mother tongue is Spanish. Spanish is a romance language derived from vulgar latin, so it's an Indo-European language in the 'CEMTUM' group.
In Latin, pluralisation and inflection in general depended on cases and words endings. It was quite complex. Nowadays, most Romance languages have forgotten cases and now use a different type of declensions, and we use lots of prepositions, and other things that didn't exist in latin. However some other romance languages still preserve some remants of the Latin case system.
OK, back to Spanish now. What we do is just to add an 's' to most female or male nouns. E.g.:
perro (dog) --> perros (dogs)
computadora (computer) --> computadoras (computers)
silla (chair) --> sillas (chairs)
hijo (son or child) --> hijos (sons or children)
When the noun ends in consonant we add 'es'. E.g.:
Árbol (tree) --> Árboles (trees)
celular (mobile phone) --> celulares (mobile phones)
sartén (pan) --> sartenes
pan (bread) --> panes (some pieces of bread)
When the noun ends in 'z' we change 'z' for 'c' and add 'es' as usual. E.g.:
Alcatraz (gannet or booby) --> Alcatraces (Gannets or boobies)
Matraz --> Matraces (sorry I don't know this one in English, but it's a little container usually made of transparent glass used for chemical reactions)
There's also something like English 'uncountable' nouns in Spanish. And it follows more or less the same criteria. E.g.:
agua (water) .- you can't usually say 'aguas' (waters), unless talking about the sea or in a literary context.
vino (wine) .- when talking about a quantity you can't say 'vinos', but you can say so when talking about different types produced in a place.
rice (arroz) .- You never say 'arroces', there's no English equivalent either.
OK, that's more or less what comes to my mind right now. I hope it was helpful.
Kind regards
Pete from Peru
In English it's typically a z-sounding ending, though sometimes it's "s" (following voiceless sounds) or schwa-z (following affricates). They all come from the "s" ending prominent in Old English plural forms, but there are exceptions. Specifically, ox/oxen, child/children, goose/geese, mouse/mice, etc.
Spanish seems to be absolutely easy in this respect, aren't there any exceptions at all?
In Russian making plural is more difficult I'd say but not so hard as in German:
feminin nouns:
sobaka - sobaki (dog-dogs)
doroga - dorogi (road-roads)
zhizn' - zhizni (life - lives)
BUT
lampa - lampY (lamp-lamps) - y is tottaly different sound, looks like Y in Polish... etc.
musculin nouns:
stol-stoly (table-tables)
gorod-goroda (town-towns)
syn - synovya (son-sons)
So plural form for musculin gender you have yo learn.
Neuter nouns:
ozero - ozyora - (lake-lakes)
okno-okna -(window-windows)
So you just add "a".
In Russian making plural is more difficult I'd say but not so hard as in German:
feminin nouns:
sobaka - sobaki (dog-dogs)
doroga - dorogi (road-roads)
zhizn' - zhizni (life - lives)
BUT
lampa - lampY (lamp-lamps) - y is tottaly different sound, looks like Y in Polish... etc.
musculin nouns:
stol-stoly (table-tables)
gorod-goroda (town-towns)
syn - synovya (son-sons)
So plural form for musculin gender you have yo learn.
Neuter nouns:
ozero - ozyora - (lake-lakes)
okno-okna -(window-windows)
So you just add "a".
Thanks, that is very interesting,
What about Italian, German and others ?
What about Italian, German and others ?
<<Spanish seems to be absolutely easy in this respect, aren't there any exceptions at all?>>
Yes, Linguist. Spanish is kind of simple when it comes to plurals, we also have no neuter gender, so that makes it easier. :)
I think there ARE some exceptions, they are quite a few though.
I remember about one: 'CURRICULUM' (a document containing info and certificates of what you've studied, and where you've worked).
You know, in Spanish. The article must agree in number and gender with the noun, Then you have:
THE
--> el (male singular)
--> la (female singular)
--> los (male plural)
--> las (female plural)
Following the above explained rules, many people makes a mistake by forming the plural of the word, keep in mind that 'CURRICULUM' comes from latin, In Spanish 'CURRICULUM' is a male noun, but in Latin I guess it was neuter, this will come to importance in a moment, just check what some people do:
singular plural
el CURRICULUM los CURRICULUMS
Despite being used by many native speakers, of all levels of education, this is against the morphologic rules of Latin. It's the rule that when we use latin words exactly as they are in Latin, we should respect their plural forms, etc. So that should be exactly as in Latin:
singular plural
el CURRICULUM los CURRICULA
Then again, despite being correct Spanish, that sounds very weird. It's against the Spanish structure (at least in our mind), there's also the fact that 'los' is for male plural nouns, and CURRICULA ends in 'a'. Nouns ending in 'a' are almost always female, so... God that's bloody strange... Then other people tend to do this
singular plural
el CURRICULUM or los CURRICULUMS
la CURRICULA
God, this has gone too far, and my beautiful language has degenerated too much... So to stop this we have the Spanish word 'CURRICULO' which is derived from the latin 'CURRICULUM' and can be used to avoid all those horrible mistakes, so use 'CURRICULO' applying the usual rules. You can perfectly say:
singular plural
el CURRICULO or los CURRICULOS
el CURRICULUM
So there you are, native Spanish speakers, and Spanish learners.
Kind regards
Pete
Yes, Linguist. Spanish is kind of simple when it comes to plurals, we also have no neuter gender, so that makes it easier. :)
I think there ARE some exceptions, they are quite a few though.
I remember about one: 'CURRICULUM' (a document containing info and certificates of what you've studied, and where you've worked).
You know, in Spanish. The article must agree in number and gender with the noun, Then you have:
THE
--> el (male singular)
--> la (female singular)
--> los (male plural)
--> las (female plural)
Following the above explained rules, many people makes a mistake by forming the plural of the word, keep in mind that 'CURRICULUM' comes from latin, In Spanish 'CURRICULUM' is a male noun, but in Latin I guess it was neuter, this will come to importance in a moment, just check what some people do:
singular plural
el CURRICULUM los CURRICULUMS
Despite being used by many native speakers, of all levels of education, this is against the morphologic rules of Latin. It's the rule that when we use latin words exactly as they are in Latin, we should respect their plural forms, etc. So that should be exactly as in Latin:
singular plural
el CURRICULUM los CURRICULA
Then again, despite being correct Spanish, that sounds very weird. It's against the Spanish structure (at least in our mind), there's also the fact that 'los' is for male plural nouns, and CURRICULA ends in 'a'. Nouns ending in 'a' are almost always female, so... God that's bloody strange... Then other people tend to do this
singular plural
el CURRICULUM or los CURRICULUMS
la CURRICULA
God, this has gone too far, and my beautiful language has degenerated too much... So to stop this we have the Spanish word 'CURRICULO' which is derived from the latin 'CURRICULUM' and can be used to avoid all those horrible mistakes, so use 'CURRICULO' applying the usual rules. You can perfectly say:
singular plural
el CURRICULO or los CURRICULOS
el CURRICULUM
So there you are, native Spanish speakers, and Spanish learners.
Kind regards
Pete
In Tagalog, you just add the plural marker "mga" before the noun.
tao (person) --> mga tao (people)
bata (child) --> mga bata (children)
libro (book) -- > mga libro (books)
Ibinigay ng maestra ang lapis at papel sa estudyante -->
Ibinigay ng maestra mga lapis at mga papel sa mga estudyante.
The schoolteacher gave the student pencil and paper -->
The schoolteacher gave the students pencils and paper (plural).
tao (person) --> mga tao (people)
bata (child) --> mga bata (children)
libro (book) -- > mga libro (books)
Ibinigay ng maestra ang lapis at papel sa estudyante -->
Ibinigay ng maestra mga lapis at mga papel sa mga estudyante.
The schoolteacher gave the student pencil and paper -->
The schoolteacher gave the students pencils and paper (plural).
Hey I had never seen Tagalog before, it uses more words of Spanish origin than I thought... that's cool.
Pete from Peru
Pete from Peru
I can give you some examples in Polish. Generally the level of difficulty is as high as in Russian.
pies - psy - dog
kot - koty - cat
książka - książki - book
życie - życia - life
droga - drogi - way
miasto - miasta - city
człowiek - ludzie (irr.) - man - people
pies - psy - dog
kot - koty - cat
książka - książki - book
życie - życia - life
droga - drogi - way
miasto - miasta - city
człowiek - ludzie (irr.) - man - people
in Korean, you add the affix "-dul" to make the plural, as in "ai" - child; "aidul" -children; "saram" -man/person; "saramdul" - men/persons (people). This ending is often omitted, leaving the singular and plural of nouns identical, especially when context indicates which one you're talking about, e.g. "kae" - dog; "kae" dogs (or "kaedul" if you want to stress more than one).