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11 Jul 14 - 07:24 AM (#3641162) Subject: hobos or hoboes? From: GUEST,trews is there a definitive spelling of the plural? Is the "e" optional? It's for a song I'm writing. |
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11 Jul 14 - 07:34 AM (#3641163) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: bubblyrat Logic would suggest that , whilst the plural of "oboe " is "oboes" , then the plural of "hobo" SHOULD be "hobos" although here in England it is somewhat academic as we call them "tramps" !! |
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11 Jul 14 - 07:46 AM (#3641169) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: GUEST, topsie As it's an American word I looked in Merriam-Webster's online dictionary - they say: plural hoboes also hobos Not sure that helps much. |
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11 Jul 14 - 08:16 AM (#3641178) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: GUEST,trews thanks - so I can spell it any way I like! |
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11 Jul 14 - 08:21 AM (#3641179) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: GUEST, topsie Yes, but you should be consistent. Choose your spelling and stick to it throughout the song/letter/essay/book you are working on at the time. |
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11 Jul 14 - 08:35 AM (#3641183) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: G-Force When I was at school I was taught: 'Negroes would be heroes to play banjoes with potatoes and dominoes with cargoes of tomatoes'. They are the only -o ending words which add -es in the plural. All others just add -s. So it's hobos for me. |
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11 Jul 14 - 09:05 AM (#3641197) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: GUEST,leeneia I was taught that an English word gets the -es, but a foreign word gets the -s. potatoes, but scherzos However, we borrow so many foreign words and get accustomed to them that after a while it's hard to tell what's foreign. No doubt 'potato' itself came from some foreign tongue. (I would use hobos because it's simpler.) |
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11 Jul 14 - 12:01 PM (#3641238) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: PHJim I always use "hobos" and "banjos", and Spell-Check agrees with me. Spell-Check also agrees with "hoboes" and "banjoes", but it won't accept "banjers". |
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11 Jul 14 - 01:25 PM (#3641273) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: MGM·Lion Just to confuse things, leeneia --- SCHERZI? ~M~ |
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11 Jul 14 - 04:02 PM (#3641325) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: Joe_F Fowler, in _Modern English Usage_ s.v. -o(e)s, discusses the question at some length. Complete consistency is impossible by now: "potatoes" would look weird without the e, and "photos" would look weird with one. He lists eight tendencies, of which the first, "Words used as freely in the plural as in the singular usually have _-oes_", seems to speak for "hoboes", tho Fowler does not mention that example. |
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12 Jul 14 - 01:39 AM (#3641450) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: PHJim Well I guess that means that the plural of banjo is "banjos". It seems that a group with more than one banjo would have one too many. Some would say that one is too many. My wife would say that I have about 4 or 5 too many. |
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12 Jul 14 - 03:32 AM (#3641462) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: GUEST,Gerry Ask Dan Quayle, he's the expert. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Quayle#.22Potatoe.22 |
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12 Jul 14 - 05:29 AM (#3641480) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: GUEST,Grishka Grammar books and Internet sites refrain from pronouncing any abstract criterion. The idea, for example on oxforddictionaries, seems to be "-os unless in a list of exceptions (considered closed for the future)". The list seems to stem from usage by authoritative writers, thus contains words that have been in common English usage for more than a century. Other words have been added by perceived analogy, often questionable (see here for a list intended for word games). Obviously the original rationale was to prevent a pronunciation like "-oss". For example, "heros", thus pronounced, refers to the notion as held in ancient Greece. Whenever a dictionary says "X or Y", writers are left alone with the problem. Not all spellings are really stylistically equivalent. From the above we may guess that "-oes" generally signals a more conservative (or learned, or British, or snobbish) style, but that may well be mistaken. The method I use (not being a native speaker) is the following: I google the spelling in question, always in quotes, together with other word I expect to appear in texts of the desired style. In this case, I googled "hobos" song which obtained a large majority over the "-oes" spelling. However, I cannot see that texts containing "hoboes" have a marked conservative (or learned, or British, or snobbish) tendency in their contents. |
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12 Jul 14 - 07:01 AM (#3641490) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: GUEST,geordielad Bliddy hell man, jist say "her-bers" like me. That'll dee the trick! |
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12 Jul 14 - 08:56 AM (#3641517) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: Steve Gardham I try to avoid the 'oes' unless it is a word I know usually has it such as 'does' 'goes'. As an English teacher for 32 years this is the policy I have always followed with such alternative spellings. |
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12 Jul 14 - 11:52 AM (#3641557) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: PHJim GUEST,Grishka, I hope you're not implying that conservative, learned, British and snobbish are synonyms. |
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12 Jul 14 - 02:06 PM (#3641581) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: GUEST,Grishka PHJim, I half expected that remark. Of course, I did my best to avoid that implication, but indeed, those notions are sometimes perceived as related, particularly from the point of view of progressive, uneducated, American anti-snobs (or should that be "counter-snobs"?) - those who tend to glorify hobos. The truth is of course much more confusing, both in history and in practical use of English. Learned British snobs sometimes sneer at American usage until someone proves that Shakespeare ... |
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13 Jul 14 - 01:08 PM (#3641830) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: GUEST,henryp I've usually considered Fowler to be descriptive rather than prescriptive, but opinions differ. A little more from Fowler Revised Third Edition by Burchfield; Hobo. Pl. hobos. See -O(E)S -O(E)S At one time or another we are all in difficulties with the plural of words which in the singular end in -o. 1. Words used as freely in the plural as in the singular, and are completely naturalized as English words, usually have -oes, though there are very few invariable examples. Recommendations for the majority of these are given at their alphabetical place in the present book. |
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13 Jul 14 - 01:23 PM (#3641837) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: Q (Frank Staplin) Doesn't anyone own a good dictionary any more? Merriam Webster's Collegiate Dictionary The Concise Oxford Dictionary. I own and use the Oxford English Dictionary (20 volumes, some supplements). I may subscribe to the online "premium" content version. |
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13 Jul 14 - 03:56 PM (#3641874) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: Lighter Remember when Dan Quayle tried to spell "potato"? |
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13 Jul 14 - 03:57 PM (#3641875) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: Lighter He was correcting a small child who had already spelled it properly on the blackboard. |
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13 Jul 14 - 09:03 PM (#3641931) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: Q (Frank Staplin) I remember potato as pronounced by the French in Maine- It sounded like po-day-do. |
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15 Jan 24 - 09:42 PM (#4195519) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: GUEST,Travis It's my understanding that hobos and tramps are not the same. A hobo works then moves along, while a tramp is generally uninterested in working at all. Hoboes with an e is harder for me to accept personally but apparently is equally correct. Whenever I hear the word tramp I think of two dogs sucking opposite ends of an excessively long spaghetti. |
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15 Jan 24 - 10:32 PM (#4195520) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: GUEST,paperback Every year, according to my mom, her dad would hop a freight to Idaho to pick potatoes and I do believe the proper term for that is hoboing (and it is interesting that for Halloween she dressed me as a hobo. How was I to know that hobo was not a career choice?) |
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16 Jan 24 - 01:45 AM (#4195527) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: GUEST *dig potatoes |
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16 Jan 24 - 02:29 AM (#4195534) Subject: RE: hobos or hoboes? From: GUEST,Phil d'Conch RE: Maine (& points south) - It's "pah-tot" ie: Lâche pas la patate. RE: Hobo(e)s - Is Dan Quayle still available? |