![]() Whether someone is a native or non-native English speaker, they almost always sense that you can’t just add an “s” to the end of words such as “canvas”, “gas”, or “iris”. This is where the confusion usually starts. Try it now! What if a noun already has an “s” at the end? Guidelines were set many years ago by grammarians-some have survived intact, some have been tweaked, and some (ahem, the nouns ending in -o) have been broken so many times that they seem nonexistent.Easy and fast! English editing at everyday low prices! We understand that much of this article is a refresher and that you probably "automatically" know when to use the -s and -es plural suffixes, but we hope that we have enlightened you on some of the rules (and the exceptions) of pluralization. If you're undecided about how to pluralize a noun ending in -o, we suggest you consult our dictionary. Nouns formed by shortening, such as combo and rhino, also break the rule since they tend to have plurals only in -s, as do many (but by no means all) words of very obvious foreign origin, such as kimono and espresso. Zeroes/zeros, cargoes/cargos, haloes/halos, and tornadoes/tornados are all established plurals, and there are many, many more. However, the rule has been broken countless times in regard to "consonant + o" words. Nouns ending in "consonant + o" take an -es ( tomatoes) those ending in "vowel + o" take an -s ( ratios). ![]() Relatively speaking, the rule governing the pluralization of nouns ending in -o is simpler. Another exception is the rule for proper nouns ending in -y, which is to add an -s-hence, Sundays, Bloody Marys, and Januarys. The -s suffix only applies to nouns ending in -ay, -ey, or -oy ( parkways, donkeys, alloys). Colloquy, for example, becomes colloquies and soliloquy becomes soliloquies. There is an exception in the case of "vowel + y": words ending in -quy. Basically, if the noun ends in a "consonant + y," the -y is changed to -i- and -es is added ( babies) if the noun ends in a "vowel + y," an -s is added ( galleys). The question of whether to use the plural suffix -s or -es sometimes arises in those words ending in -y. In this way, both poets laureate and poet laureates are acceptable. But if the adjective tends to be understood as a noun, the compound may have more than one plural form. And compounds made up of a noun followed by an adjective are usually pluralized by adding -s to the noun, as when heir apparent becomes heirs apparent. For a compound made up of two nouns separated by a preposition, the first noun is pluralized to form the plural, as in attorneys-at-law, chiefs of staff, and bases on balls. This means that hanger-on becomes hangers-on, onlooker becomes onlookers, and passerby becomes passersby. If a compound is made of a noun with the -er suffix and an adverb, only the noun element is pluralized. Things get a bit more complicated than this, though. Nouns that are made up of words that are not nouns also form their plurals on the last element, as in the plurals breakthroughs and tip-offs. Most compounds that are made up of two nouns-whether they appear as one word, two words, or a hyphenated word-form their plurals by changing the final element only a word like bookcase is pluralized as bookcases, book club as book clubs, and bird-watcher as bird-watchers. ![]() ![]() So whereas a fisherman would say "I caught three bass," a scientist would say "I'm researching the various basses of the Atlantic Ocean." Generally, those who hunt, fish for, or raise animals are most likely to use the unchanged form, and the -s form is often used to emphasize diversity of kinds. On the other hand, some have only one or the other: the plural of monkey is only monkeys the plural of the fish known as shad is shad. The names of many fishes, birds, and mammals have both a plural that is formed with a suffix and one that is identical with the singular ( partridges and partridge are plural forms and so are caribous and caribou). For example, there are the common singular nouns used unchanged as plurals ("caught two fish"), compound words in which the first element is sometimes pluralized and sometimes not ( runners-up, close-ups), and words ending in -y and -o that only take the suffix -s? These exceptions became so common that grammarians were forced to lay out rules for the them. That's pretty easy to apply in one's writing, but not all nouns follow the general pattern. The most basic rule is to pluralize a noun by adding the suffix -s (as in voters) however, if the noun ends in -s, -x, -z, -sh, or -ch (with the exception-see, we already have an exception-of words ending in -ch pronounced with a hard k, like monarchs and stomachs), the suffix -es is added in order to create an extra syllable to pronounce the plural-as in goddesses, anticlimaxes, blitzes, flashes, and torches.
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