| 词组 | memorandum |
| 释义 | memorandum Quite a bit has been written about the plural forms of memorandum, starting back in the 1870s when Richard Grant White put forward a plea for the English plural memorandums. Ayres 1881 demurred, on grounds too obscure now to be worth pursuing. Hall 1917 noted that memorandums was well established, citing Boswell and Defoe, among others. Modern concern is over memoranda used as a singular (though it has not gone out of style as a plural) and was apparently first expressed by Vizetelly 1906. Since then quite a few commentators take on the subject, right up to Harper 1985 and Shaw 1987. Almost everybody discourages memoranda as a singular and abominates memorandas, except Evans 1957, who is the latitudi-narian in this instance. Ordinarily when there is so much discussion of a Latin plural, we have a lot of evidence for the alleged misuse, but not in this case: memoranda, singular, and memorandas almost never appear in print. We do have a little evidence from speech, particularly from congressional hearings. Pyles 1979 has examples of singular memoranda from attorney Joseph Welch during the Army-McCarthy hearings of 1954, and we recorded Robert MacFarlane using it at the Iran-Contra hearings in 1987. But even most testifiers before congressional committees seem to have few problems, although once in a great while memorandum as a plural will slip out. So apparently there is not much of a problem here, and no real writing problem at all. Memoranda and memorandums are about equally common and both have good literary precedent; you can take your pick. For more foreign plurals that vex English speakers, See Latin plurals. |
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