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ESL forum > Grammar and Linguistics > People vs. Persons (+ interesting article)    

People vs. Persons (+ interesting article)



Vickiii
New Zealand

I am with Jorge on this one Frenchie.

booking a table for 3 persons sounds really strange.  The crime reports would say 3 eleged persons were seen leaving a table. alleged oops - damn I hate not having spell checker on firefox!

But then you know us kiwis - we are rather informal.  I would have a little giggle if i heard a native speaker say that. 

IF it was someone with english as a second language believe me after my experiences of speaking a 2nd language I wouldn �t even flutter an eyelid let alone bat one!

BTW - I love your new avatar - I am still laughing!  I am wondering which particular person you are thinking of as the chicken....

LOLThe many faces of frenchie! 


Very interesting article Frenchie!  It does prove my point that the french are the root of all of our problems.  IT seems that their adding words to the english language has caused great confusion.

Wink

21 Mar 2009     



frenchfrog
France

Oh boy! Native speakers do not agree!! Confused I like it so much when you disagree!! LOL
Well, I �ll continue to teach "one person, two people" because "persons" seems to be for specific cases only. But as Vickiii wrote "I will not flutter an eyelid let alone bat one"! Thumbs Up
The article was very interesting indeed! French has also its idiosyncracies!!

21 Mar 2009     



eng789
Israel

Frenchy - I hope you come out clean - some persons/people would prefer you that way.
 
 

21 Mar 2009     



alien boy
Japan

Hi Frenchie!

I �m a native speaker, with almost 20 years experience in the hospitality industry - including formal (5 star hotels & fine dining restaurants) & informal (cafes). In my experience we would never use �persons� in the context of a restaurant booking.

While �persons � is grammatically correct, in practice it is not natural for a native speaker to use it in this situation. A native speaker would say either:

"I have booked a table for five."
"I have booked a table for five people." In this instance �people � indicates that the five people are members of the same group/party. You could consider �people� to be a singular noun meaning �a group of related persons�.
�Persons � would indicate that the people are individuals and do not have discernible relationships.

Cheers,
AB

22 Mar 2009     



Jayho
Australia

In my native speaker opinion I would mark people as correct and and emphasise that locals would say people whereas persons is usually used in legal contexts such as signage, judical matters etc.  Yes people do say persons but they probably don �t speak English as their first language and are thus unaware of this difference.

23 Mar 2009     



Zora
Canada

Hmm... this discussion is over BUT I �d say both are correct but one is much more formal than the other and "persons" is falling into disuse or used only in a "legal and formal" context nowadays.

For example:

At the Police Station you file a - Missing Persons Report.

Elevators always say for example: "Max. 8 persons"

In Handicap areas you have signs saying: Persons with Disabilities ....

Planes/hotels/bars: (same as elevators) - Max. occupancy 120 persons.

Airport: Persons with Luggage...


Smile 

23 Mar 2009     

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