PHENOMENON VS PHENOMENA MANUAL

However, they also note that, for all meanings, media as a plural count noun or non-count noun with a plural verb is still far more common than media as a singular count noun or non-count noun with a singular verb.

Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage goes into greater detail, saying that the non-count use (i.e., singular verb) of media seems to be on the rise, similar to the non-count use of the word data.

Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary says that media is singular or plural in construction (i.e., the media is…, the media are…).

PHENOMENON VS PHENOMENA MANUAL

The Chicago Manual of Style says that media is a plural form (i.e., the media are…).

The Oxford Canadian Dictionary says that media can be treated as singular or plural (i.e., the media is…, the media are…).What are the forms for this case? Here’s where there is a bit of disagreement, which mostly stems from whether you look at media as a plural count noun (that takes a plural verb form) or a non-count noun (that takes a singular verb form). But our students are likely primarily concerned with the 'mass media' (TV, radio, social media, etc.) meaning.

In most meanings outside of 'mass media,' the singular form is medium and the plural is media. Mediaīorrowed from Latin, the English words medium and media are tricky because they have more than one meaning. Majority rules: Use phenomenon for the singular and phenomena for the plural, at least for now! Medium Vs. Let’s keep the confusion to a minimum! My Conclusion However, they don’t recommend using phenomena as a singular form until it becomes much more common in speech and print, if it ever does. They list the possible plural forms as phenomena (the much more common form) when the meaning is 'an observable fact or event' but phenomenons when the meaning is 'an exceptional, unusual, or abnormal person, things, or occurrence.'ĭid you know that phenomena has been in use as a singular form, primarily in speech, since 1576? How about phenomenas as a plural form since 1635? Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage suggests that the singular phenomena is no more irregular than the words 'agenda' and 'stamina,' which are clearly accepted as singular. However, both Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary and Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage go into greater detail on the usage and history of the word. In fact, both the Oxford Canadian Dictionary and the Chicago Manual of Style list only these two entries.

Phenomenaīorrowed from Greek, the English word phenomenon is the most common singular form and phenomena is the most common plural form. I thought I’d investigate medium and media while I was at it, too, since media is a word frequently used these days. The head writer at ESL Library recently asked me about phenomenon and phenomena, and I was surprised that there was more to it than simply singular vs. Often these exceptions come from words that are borrowed from other languages such as Greek or Latin. But, like almost all of the rules in English grammar, there are exceptions. English plurals are usually easy for students to form-just add ‑s to the end of the singular word.

Phenomenon vs phenomena