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This question is Not Answered
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pieanne
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77565
Tue, 01 Mar 05 03:06 PM
Teachers,
If I'm not wrong, these words are followed by a verb in the plural:
furniture, luggage, police, news, and others.
If we want to have a singular, then we use:
a policeman (of course)
a piece of furniture (or table, armchair etc)/of news/ of luggage (or suitcase)
Could you please list some others?
Thank you.
Joined on
Thu, Jan 20 2005
South of France ...But I'm Belgian!
Veteran Member
7,517
I'm glad to help, but I'm not a native! And please excuse my typos...
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pieanne
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Tue, 01 Mar 05 06:35 PM
I'm sorry, I should have posted this in "general English grammar questions"... My mistake!
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Sand
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77643
Tue, 01 Mar 05 11:09 PM
I am a native English speaker and I find furniture, luggage, and news are happy with the singular verb. Police can be plural. Fish and sheep can be either. Scissors and pants are plural.
Joined on
Thu, Jan 27 2005
New Member
22
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pieanne
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Wed, 02 Mar 05 08:39 AM
Thank you, Sand
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Mister Micawber
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Wed, 02 Mar 05 01:14 PM
To avoid accusations of sexism, you should use 'police officer', Pieanne.
The furniture/luggage/baggage/news/equipment/information/money/grass/work/macaroni is heavy/interesting/green/delicious. All uncountable nouns singular in form.
The police/cattle/clothes/groceries/jeans/scissors are efficient/hungry/fashionable/expensive. All uncountable nouns plural in form.
Joined on
Wed, Aug 4 2004
Yokohama
Veteran Member
30,823
'The question is,' said Humpty Dumpty, 'which is to be master-- that's all.'
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pieanne
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Wed, 02 Mar 05 01:18 PM
Yes, you're right, Mr M. Does 'a police person" exist?
AND I've just realised I made a terrible mistake in my first post: OF COURSE furniture, luggage etc are followed by a singular. But you've given me precious information (sg) about cattleand jeans! Thank you!
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Sand
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Wed, 02 Mar 05 01:25 PM
In this context it is interesting to note that there is a Finnish noun classification called partative which is imbedded in English but not obvious. Partative nouns indicate a class of objects rather than a particular object. There is no article in Finnish such as "the" but the postposition modification of Finnish nouns makes up for this lack. This is perhaps slightly irrelevant to this forum but it does make one sensitive to the variations in the application of nouns - even in English - to comprehend that a noun can denote either a singular object or a class of objects.
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