| 释义 |
pluralize, v.|ˈplʊərəlaɪz|
[a. F. pluraliser: see plural and -ize.]
1. a. trans. To make plural; to attribute plurality to; to express in the plural.
1803Monthly Mag. XV. 3 We cannot well avoid the use of many ancient words unaltered, as English nouns; but I would lay it down as a rule, never to pluralize them by inflection, but simply by the addition of the s or es. 1854Blackw. Mag. LXXVI. 520 Gulliver, to magnify present times, pluralises them all and each. 1864Mattie, a Stray II. 251 ‘Perhaps it serves us right’, said Mattie, pluralizing the case after her old fashion. 1871Earle Philol. Eng. Tongue §382 Those words which we have adopted from Latin or Greek..unaltered, have usually been pluralised according to Greek and Latin grammar.
b. intr. Of a word or phrase: To become plural; to assume plural form.
1871Earle Philol. Eng. Tongue §599 Any part of speech will assume in compounding the substantive character, and will pluralise as such.
c. intr. To express or form the plural.
1964Language XL. 135 The way in which speakers of English pluralize.
2. intr. To hold more than one benefice (or office) at one time; to be or become a pluralist.
1842[see pluralist 1 b]. a1875[see pluralized].
Hence ˈpluralized ppl. a., ˈpluralizing vbl. n. and ppl. a.; also pluraliˈzation, the act of pluralizing.
1813W. Taylor in Monthly Rev. LXXI. 475 The pluralizing formulas [in language]. 1836G. S. Faber Prim. Doctr. Election i. ix. 133 Clement, by his use of a pluralising phraseology in the first person, shews us [etc.]. a1875R. S. Hawker Prose Wks. (1893) 169 A pluralised clergyman of the days of the Georges. 1878H. Spencer in Pop. Sc. Monthly July 300 ‘Inferiors invariably use the third person plural in addressing their superiors’: a form which, while dignifying the superior by pluralization, increases the distance of the inferior by its relative indirectness. 1970English Studies LI. 395 Participles used as adjectival modifiers were also disregarded, as were those used nominally (with actual or potential determiners, pluralisation, or government by a preposition). 1972Language XLVIII. 356 All these authors, characteristically, regard the rules of Spanish pluralization as phonological ones. 1978Amer. Speech LIII. 35 Personal singular you similarly takes what is formally a plural verb form (are, were), as do French vous, German Sie, and Russian vy; as with singular they—themself, this ‘pluralization’ of singular you can be said to follow reflexivization (whence a plural verb but a singular reflexive yourself). |