Does the word etiquette has the plural form?
By RUBESH
@Manasha (2727)
Pondicherry, India
September 13, 2012 4:31am CST
yesterday when I was teaching, one of my student asked about the plural form of etiquette. Really, I have no ideas about it. I think we have no plural form for the above word.
1 response
@owlwings (43915)
• Cambridge, England
13 Sep 12
One normally only speaks of 'etiquette' in the singular, since it refers to a collection of rules or customs and is therefore a collective (and, perhaps in some senses, an abstract) noun.
It would be legitimate to use the plural only to a limited extent, such as if one wrote 'a comparison of the etiquettes of email and of the written letter'.
@owlwings (43915)
• Cambridge, England
17 Sep 12
By the way, you should have asked: "Does the word etiquette have a plural form?" because the word 'does' is an auxiliary verb used like this (in statement form):
I do have
You do have
He/she/it does have
We do have
You do have
They do have
'Do' is normally an emphatic auxiliary but is very commonly used without any particular emphasis to start a question. Another way of asking the same question (quite correctly) would be: "Has the word 'etiquette' a plural form?" but English speakers seem to like to keep the verb between the subject and the object where possible, even when asking a question. There are some questions which sound distinctly odd, 'poetic' or 'old fashioned' if they don't begin with 'Do' or 'Does'!
"Go you to town often?" is perfectly correct but no standard English speaker would ever say it (though it does survive in dialect). "Do you go to town often?" is the usual form.
