Complete list of irregular English plurals

Continuing our irregular series of lists, you can find here all the irregular English plurals that occur in the COCA more than 5 times. It's just shy of 1,650 words, but about 20% of them are different kinds of men, women, and children (e.g., madmen, charwomen, foster-children).

Note 1: The list is unedited, but I believe I've set it so that you can edit it if you sign in with a Google account. Please feel free to remove any obvious problems.

Note 2: The list ignores any irregulars such as bass that end with s. Feel free to add.

The top 50 are listed below:

1. children
2. women
3. men
4. police
5. feet
6. teeth
7. personnel
8. criteria
9. gentlemen
10. cattle
11. bacteria
12. sox
13. grandchildren
14. fishermen
15. phenomena
16. mice
17. clergy
18. businessmen
19. curricula
20. alumni
21. policemen
22. freshmen
23. stimuli
24. geese
25. larvae
26. algae
27. tsunami
28. congressmen
29. fungi
30. memorabilia
31. gunmen
32. coli
33. schoolchildren
34. nuclei
35. brethren
36. servicemen
37. spectra
38. firemen
39. sushi
40. craftsmen
41. countrymen
42. linemen
43. strata
44. salesmen
45. nebulae
46. spokesmen
47. salespeople
48. paparazzi
49. horsemen
50. sportsmen

OUP Canadian dictionary loses its entire staff

"Earlier this fall, Oxford University Press laid off the Canadian dictionary's entire staff of four, including 'Canada's Word Lady,' editor-in-chief Katherine Barber, citing decreased demand for print dictionaries by 10 to 15 per cent North America-wide. Canadian branch president David Stover says the availability of free online resources like Dictionary.com was the biggest factor in the layoffs, and that 'the economic assumptions the industry has been built on that have endured really for decades now have changed, and we have to change with them.'" - From the Toronto Star's Nicole Baute.

Presenting at TESL Ontario

If you're in the Toronto area next weekend, come and see me at the TESL Ontario conference. I'll be presenting Friday and again on Saturday. I'd be happy to get together for lunch or a drink. You can e-mail me at brett.reynolds@humber.ca

NACLO & a puzzle

The third annual North American Computational Linguistics Olympiad is currently registering high school students for the 2009 competition.

"This olympiad is a contest in which high-school students solve linguistic puzzles. In solving the problems, students learn about the diversity and consistency of language, while exercising logic skills. No prior knowledge of linguistics or second languages is necessary. Professionals in linguistics, computational linguistics and language technologies use dozens of the world's languages to create engaging problems that represent cutting edge issues in their fields. The competition has attracted top students to study and work in those same fields. This is truly an opportunity for young people to experience a taste of natural-language processing in the 21st century.

The first round is on February 4, 2009. Top performers will be invited to the second round on March 11, 2009."

Here's one of the questions from last year, which I found particularly fun. At first I had no idea where to start, but eventually a few words started to become clear. There was something in the back of my mind, but I couldn't access it. And then, suddenly, it all just fell into place.

An excerpt from a well known text is shown below. It is in two languages (X and Y) that are closely linguistically related to each other and also to English. However the two versions are not perfect translations of one another.

Text in language X
X1. Rödluvan: Men mormor, varför har du så stora ögon?
X2. "Mormor": Det är bara för attjag skall se dig bättre, mitt bam.
X3. Rödluvan: Men mormor, varför har du så stora öron?
X4. "Mormor": Det är bara för attjag skall höra dig bättre, mitt bam.
X5. Rödluvan: Men mormor, varför har du så stora tänder?
X6. "Mormor": Det är bara för attjag skall kunna äta upp dig!

(almost) the same text in language Y
Y1. - Så store ører du har, bestemor, sa Rødhette.
Y2. - Det er fordi jeg skal kunne høre deg bedre, svarte ulven.
Y3. - Så store øyne du har, bestemor, sa Rødhette.
Y 4. - Det er fordi j eg skal kunne se deg bedre, svarte ulven.
Y5. - Så store hender du har, bestemor, sa Rødhette.
Y6. - Det er fordi jeg skal kunne klemme deg bedre, svarte ulven.
Y7. - Så stor munn du har, bestemor, sa Rødhette.
Y8. - Det er fordi jeg skal kunne ete deg bedre, svarte ulven.

Dl (practical). Translate sentences X1 and X2 into grammatical English using your own words and word order.

Spelling Bee

For those wishing to test their spelling chops, The Visual Thesaurus has developed a spelling bee. Ben Zimmer, executive producer of the Visual Thesaurus, writes,

"The reason why it’s so addictive is that it’s been designed to be adaptive, so the more words that are spelled correctly, the more difficult the words become. And conversely, if you’re not a great speller, the words will get easier and easier. That way a player will always be quizzed at the appropriate skill level — from the orthographically challenged to the most expert spellers. As more and more players try the Bee, the game has steadily improved based on data collected on how words are spelled. Words are being continuously reanalyzed for difficulty based on how spellers fare. Every five minutes, words are rescored for difficulty taking into account the latest data from the Bee spellers. That means there’s an increasingly better fit to different skill levels. "

I ran into a number of problems: First of all, the sound wouldn't play when I used Firefox 3.0.3 on my Mac, but Safari was fine. Once I had overcome the sound problems, I occasionally found a consonant was unclear; no matter how hard I try, I still hear a /p/ at the beginning of bloviate. Other similar problems were /f/ and /s/ sounding the same. Sometimes I knew a word, but the pronunication threw me. Other times, two words were homophonous (e.g., buckle & buccal) and I went for the wrong one.

My score seemed to plateau at 620.