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Anonymous Posted 18 years ago
Vocabulary

Singular or a plural verb with a collective noun?

0Hi, 02br
02br
00I've got a question. I know that you should generally use the singular form of a verb with collective nouns (e.g. My team is here. The herd is moving south.), but a few things confuse me with two specific nouns - police and family. I always see plurals with police. Why is that? Is it just an exception to the rule? And a few days ago I saw a sentence in my textbook saying 'Mark asked Jenny if all of her family were still in town.'. Now, I would have understood it if 'family' was followed by 'members', that's logical, but I don't understand the particular example. Could you please help here?02br
02br
00Marina0-
  

Top answer

02br 00First, it is not so general-- I believe that BrE prefers 01i 00the team are here02i 00. 02br 01i 00Family02i 00 can be singular or plural, depending on how the speaker is viewing it/them-- as a single group or as several related individuals. 02br 00.

— Mister Micawber

  • 02br 00First, it is not so general-- I believe that BrE prefers 01i 00the team are here02i 00.
  • 02br 01i 00Family02i 00 can be singular or plural, depending on how the speaker is viewing it/them-- as a single group or as several related individuals.
  • 02br 00.
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10 Answers
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0 .02br
00First, it is not so general-- I believe that BrE prefers 01i00the team are here02i00. The word01i00 police02i00 is in a different classification-- a group of nouns with no singular form, like 01i00cattle, clothes02i00 and 01i00jeans02i00.02br
01i00Family02i
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0 Dear Marina, I am glad you care a lot for English plural forms of nouns. You are probably learning English as a Second Language.02br
00The noun police is followed by a plural verb because it is a very big group of people. For one Individual, we talk of a Policeman or a policewoman. For the word Family, I need to check with other coleagues. 02br
02br
00Chris, a S
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0Is this the Marina that has written to Tyler_279? If so, could you write back? 0-
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0Hi Anon For the word Family, I need to check with other coleagues. 01b00(The word 'family' can be used with a singular or plural noun, as Mister Micawber said.)02b00 0-
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In this case you can say the same thing about the noun "army", however, this noun is almost always used as a singular noun.
Thank you!

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"all of her family were" 'of her family' is a prepositional phrase. The verb 'were' has to agree with 'all' the subject.
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You're more or less correct, Anon, though "all of her family" is the subject, not just "all".

Partitive expressions like "all of her family" are called 'fused-head' constructions.

In this case, all means "all members", and all of her family then means "all members of her family".

"All members" can only be plural, so the verb too must be plural "were".
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I think "if" puts it in the conditional form, as in: I love him as if he were my own son. English is a very complex language with difficult rules. Good luck.
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Do you say a committee of students and teachers choose or chooses a play?

My answer is: A committee of students and teachers choose a play.

I chose this option because "and" is between the two nouns.

Although committee is collective teachers and students would indicate who the members of the committee are.

Looking forward yo your feedback


Anonymous

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The answer to the question about using "were" with "family" is because it is being used in the conditional tense. If my family were... For example, if I were you, I would... I believe in general, the family is treated as a singular noun. "My family is/was in town last week."

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