[Grammar] People

Status
Not open for further replies.

petradolores

Member
Joined
Apr 4, 2011
Member Type
Student or Learner
Native Language
Italian
Home Country
Italy
Current Location
Italy
Hi everyone,
I just want to ask which phrase is correct and why:

1. People is beautiful.
2. People are beautiful.

thanks for answering.
 
Last edited:

emsr2d2

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Jul 28, 2009
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
British English
Home Country
UK
Current Location
UK
Hi everyone,
I just want to ask which phrase is correct and why:

1. People is beauty
2. People are beauty

​Thanks for answering.

Neither sentence is correct. You should be using an adjective not a noun for the last word of the sentence. Do you think "People" is singular or plural? Once you have worked that out, you will know if you should use "is" or "are". You also need a full stop at the end of each sentence.
 

petradolores

Member
Joined
Apr 4, 2011
Member Type
Student or Learner
Native Language
Italian
Home Country
Italy
Current Location
Italy
Sorry, I had to write beautiful! Silly distraction mistake!
Anyway, you're telling me to work out if I think that people is singular or plural but my doubt was just this!!! The question is: is the word people singular or plural? Should I use a singular or a plural verb after it?

Thanks.
 
Last edited:

emsr2d2

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Jul 28, 2009
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
British English
Home Country
UK
Current Location
UK
Sorry, I had to write people is beautiful! Silly distraction mistake!
Anyway my doubt was about the word "people". The question is: is it singular or plural? Should I use a singular or a plural verb after it?

thanks

Have you looked up the word "People" in a dictionary? If you think it is singular, what do you think the plural is? If you think it is plural, what do you think the singular is? We're not going to do the work for you!
 

Hanem

Member
Joined
Sep 11, 2009
Member Type
Student or Learner
Native Language
Albanian
Home Country
Albania
Current Location
Albania
Content deleted as the OP has been asked to try to work this out for themselves.
 
Last edited by a moderator:

emsr2d2

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Jul 28, 2009
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
British English
Home Country
UK
Current Location
UK
Hanem, please ensure that your member profile information is correct. It says your current location is Albania. Your IP address shows that is not the case.
 

petradolores

Member
Joined
Apr 4, 2011
Member Type
Student or Learner
Native Language
Italian
Home Country
Italy
Current Location
Italy
I want to apologize if it seemed thay I wanted you to do the work for me. This was not my aim at all. Also beacuse it would have been easier for me to look up this word in a dictionary instead of posting it here. I just want to clarify that I did it because after looking it up into the dictionary, I still had some doubts as the examples given there are not really helpful to me. But, I guess this also depends on the fact that in italian we use two different words to say "people": one of them is singular and the other is plural. Anyway, I'll try to work it out while reading in English and, most of all, I'll try to select in a more careful way the things I post in order to avoid this kind of misunderstandings. Thanks for your time.
 

Raymott

VIP Member
Joined
Jun 29, 2008
Member Type
Academic
Native Language
English
Home Country
Australia
Current Location
Australia
I want to apologize if it seemed thay I wanted you to do the work for me. This was not my aim at all. Also beacuse it would have been easier for me to look up this word in a dictionary instead of posting it here. I just want to clarify that I did it because after looking it up into the dictionary, I still had some doubts as the examples given there are not really helpful to me. But, I guess this also depends on the fact that in italian we use two different words to say "people": one of them is singular and the other is plural. Anyway, I'll try to work it out while reading in English and, most of all, I'll try to select in a more careful way the things I post in order to avoid this kind of misunderstandings. Thanks for your time.
There's no big deal. "La gente es bella"; "Le persone sono belle". (gente is singular, persone is plural). But in English, people is plural. "People are beautiful." There's really no need to have a cow over it!
 

emsr2d2

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Jul 28, 2009
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
British English
Home Country
UK
Current Location
UK
When I said "We're not going to do the work for you", I wasn't suggesting that you had actually asked us to do that or that you expected us to do it. However, if you had said in post #1 something like "I have already looked up the word "people" in several dictionaries but I am still confused as to whether it is singular or plural", we would have known you had tried to work it out for yourself. It's not a problem but, in future, when asking us a question, tell us what you think the answer is, why you think so, what research led you to that suggestion etc.
 

kamel2

New member
Joined
Sep 23, 2013
Member Type
Student or Learner
Native Language
Arabic
Home Country
Iraq
Current Location
Iraq
" People are beautiful" I think is correct .
 

5jj

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Oct 14, 2010
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
British English
Home Country
Czech Republic
Current Location
Czech Republic
" People are beautiful" I think is correct .
Kamel, please note this extract from the forum guidelines;

You are welcome to reply to any of the questions posted in the Ask a Teacher Forum, even if you are not a teacher. In fact, your answers and contributions are most welcome. However, you will need to state clearly in your post that you are not teacher. Please remember, the person whose questions you are answering or whose thread you are contributing ideas to believes the help is coming from a teacher.
 

petradolores

Member
Joined
Apr 4, 2011
Member Type
Student or Learner
Native Language
Italian
Home Country
Italy
Current Location
Italy
When I said "We're not going to do the work for you", I wasn't suggesting that you had actually asked us to do that or that you expected us to do it. However, if you had said in post #1 something like "I have already looked up the word "people" in several dictionaries but I am still confused as to whether it is singular or plural", we would have known you had tried to work it out for yourself. It's not a problem but, in future, when asking us a question, tell us what you think the answer is, why you think so, what research led you to that suggestion etc.

Ok, I'll follow your tips and will be more accurate in writing questions next time. Have a nice day.
 

kamel2

New member
Joined
Sep 23, 2013
Member Type
Student or Learner
Native Language
Arabic
Home Country
Iraq
Current Location
Iraq
Thank you ...Thank you
and I am sorry about my mistakes in fact I am a new member here so I do not have a lot of information about these my mistake anyway I am trying to learn to be good Thank you again.
 

Marco_BR

Junior Member
Joined
Apr 18, 2013
Member Type
Native Language
Portuguese
Home Country
Brazil
Current Location
Brazil
I think that the substantive "people" can be used in the singular or plural, depending of its meaning.
However I also have my doubts.
(I am a student).
Thanks!
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top