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Usenet Posted 22 years ago
Usage

Singular or plural?

"The disease gets around primarily by sexual intercourse, exchange of bodily fluids, shared needles, and blood transfusions."

What's the rule for using singular or plural nouns in a sentence like this one? Why not 'sexual intercourses' and 'exchanges of bodily fluids' and 'shared needle' and 'blood transfusion'?
  

Top answer

" What's the rule ... a sentence like this one? [/nq] There's no rule for all of these words, it's more a question of what feels like naturla usage in the ocntext.

— Usenet

  • " What's the rule ...
  • a sentence like this one?
  • [/nq] There's no rule for all of these words, it's more a question of what feels like naturla usage in the ocntext.
  • Intercourse is not a countable noun.
  • You can't have two intercourses on the same night; you can have two shags or you can have intercourse twice (or more).
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2 Answers
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[nq:1]"The disease gets around primarily by sexual intercourse, exchange of bodily fluids, shared needles, and blood transfusions." What's the rule ... a sentence like this one? Why not 'sexual intercourses' and 'exchanges of bodily fluids' and 'shared needle' and 'blood transfusion'?[/nq]
There's no rule for all of these words, it's more a question of what feels like naturla usage in the ocnt
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[nq:1]"The disease gets around primarily by sexual intercourse, exchange of bodily fluids, shared needles, and blood transfusions." What's the rule ... a sentence like this one? Why not 'sexual intercourses' and 'exchanges of bodily fluids' and 'shared needle' and 'blood transfusion'?[/nq]
No rule applies to either sequences of mixed
single and plural nouns or to this specific
sentence
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