Plurals

“Do Kennedy’s have to work …”

Apostrophes, Plurals

I saw this yesterday on Fox News Channel.

Problem:
The apostrophe does not belong.

Explanation:
The news-related discussion on Fox News Channel (FNC) was about Caroline Kennedy’s public-relations campaign to get selected by New York’s governor to be the replacement for Senator Hillary Clinton, who had been nominated by President-Elect Barack Obama to be his Secretary of State.

FNC displayed a banner at the bottom of the TV screen during the discussion.

The banner asked “DO KENNEDY’S HAVE TO WORK TWICE AS HARD?” because the discussion focused on whether a member of the Kennedy family has to work harder to prove himself or herself to the public so as to avoid the appearance of a sense of entitlement from the legacy of President John F. Kennedy.

Pluralizing a proper noun that ends in “y” requires simply that an “s” be added to the end.

In other words, a name such as “Kennedy” should not be changed to “Kennedies” — with an I-E-S –and should not be changed to “Kennedy’s” — with an APOSTROPHE-S — when pluralizing it.

I suspect that a spelling checker encouraged the TV banner writer to make the mistake of pluralizing “Kennedy” by adding an apostrophe followed by an “s” because a spelling checker will recognize this form as correct. Unfortunately, this form is correct for the possessive, singular form of “Kennedy” and not for the plural form of “Kennedy”.

Solution:
“Do Kennedys have to work …”

“Alumnus” vs. “Alumna” vs. “Alumni” vs. “Alumnae”

Common English Blunders, Foreign Languages, Nouns, Plurals, Versus

I thought about these nouns after seeing what I considered to be a misuse of one of them the other day.

Problem:
Many people are confused about which noun to use for which group of people.

Explanation:
My wife received in the mail two days ago a publication by her undergraduate and graduate-school alma mater.

The publication had a page devoted to one of its graduates.

The graduate was a woman, and the title on the page was “Alumni Profile” followed by her name.

I consider “Alumni” in the title to be inappropriate. I would have used “Alumna” instead. Here is the explanation.

The noun “alumnus” means a male graduate or former student of a particular university, college, or school.

The noun “alumna” means a female graduate or former student of a particular university, college, or school.

The noun “alumni” means male graduates or former students of a particular university, college, or school.

The noun “alumnae” means female graduates or former students of a particular university, college, or school.

Many colleges and universities use “alumni” to refer to males and females. This is analogous to the use of the masculine plural form in Spanish when referring to a group of only males or to a group of males and females.

Historically female colleges and universities that now accept males take a different tack: they use “alumnae and alumni” or “alumnae/i” to refer to their collective group of female and male graduates.

Solution:
Use “alumna” for a woman. Use “alumnae” for a group of women. Use “alumnus” for a man. Use “alumni” for a group of men or for a group of men and women. Never call an individual “an alumni” of a school, college, or university.

“Dwarves” vs. “Rooves”

Nouns, Plurals, Versus

I thought of these two words after learning recently that the singular form of one of them relates to Fannie Mae.

Problem:
One of these is not a proper word.

Explanation:
Fannie Mae — the U.S. Federal National Mortgage Association — has been in the news a lot recently, given the recent failures in the U.S. mortgage and banking industries.

I learned the other day that a “dwarf” in Fannie Mae lingo is the name given to a pool of mortgage-backed, Fannie Mae-issued securities with a maturity of 15 years.

As I wrote earlier this year, the plural form of the singular noun “roof” is “roofs” and never “rooves”.

In contrast, the plural form of the singular noun “dwarf” is either “dwarfs” — spelled D-W-A-R-F-S — or “dwarves” — spelled D-W-A-R-V-E-S.

This gives us the solution.

Solution:
“Dwarves” is a proper word (a plural form of the singular noun “dwarf”). “Rooves”, in contrast, is not a proper word.