I’m in the middle of proofreading an English-language book for a Japanese publisher. In one chapter, there is a scene in which the characters are in a Japanese restaurant trying out various dishes. Within the conversation, there are the following sentences:
In all situations they are referring to the food and not the animal itself. Now, my questions:
Would you say crab or crabs? Please explain your reasoning.
Would you say ***octopus ***or octopuses? Please explain.
Would you say “I want ***octopus/an octopuses.” ***
Would you say “Do you have it/them?”
How about if the word was shrimp, prawn, clam, etc.?
“Crab”, because “crabs” in English refers to crab lice. As well, “crab” is generally understood to refer to the species as a whole, and most people don’t specify the type.
“Octopus” already ends in an “s”, and to say “octopuses” sounds laboured and awkward, and besides, the correct plural is “octopi”. As well, we are not given a choice between two or more types of octopi.
Actually, in English, you would more than likely say, “I want the octopus.” or when ordering, you would say to the waiter, “I’ll have the octopus”.
“I want the octopus, do you have it?” You’re asking for one order of octopus, and checking on the availability of same.
“I’ll have the shrimp,” or “I’ll have shrimp.”
“I’ll have prawns,” or “I’ll have the prawns,” or to be more specific, “I’ll have the curried prawn.”
Clam depends on the item. If the dish is not specified but there are different flavors of it and clam is one of them, “I’ll have the clam,”; if there is more specification about it, especially in regard to how it is cooked, you’d say, “I’ll have the steamed clams.”
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crab, since I am referring to a kind of food rather than the animal itself. I would say lamb, not lambs; chicken, not chickens; and duck, not ducks. However, I might say crabs if they were small crabs and it took more than one to make a meal (e.g. soft-shell crabs.)
octopus. Same reasoning as above.
octopus. Same reasoning.
it. Same reasoning; the name of the food is singular.
I would say prawns and clams (and oysters, mussels, etc.) because it takes more than animal to make a meal. Shrimp is a bit iffy; I would probably say shrimp because that is often used as the plural as well.
Linguistically, “octopi” is just wrong. The correct Latin plural is octopodes; “octopi” is pseudo-Latin, a word that looks like Latin but isn’t. However, “octopi” is one of those mistakes that is made so frequently that it has now entered some dictionaries, and is sort-of-accepted. The most correct plural in English is “octopuses.”
Wow. Thanks again everyone for the quick replies and detailed explanations. I’m hoping to get a few more posts from others to get a consensus. Maybe I should have made a poll. Hehehe. I’ll keep tracking things from here.
Since you want a consensus, I’ll come in and say: this. We’re talking about the meat, the stuff, not discrete animals (even if the serving size is one animal). Setting aside the meaning of crabs as lice, “Do you like crabs?” is asking if I’m interested in the live sea creatures. “Do you like crab?” is asking if I enjoy eating crab meat.
Would you say crab or crabs? Please explain your reasoning.
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As a food, “crab.” As creatures in general, “crabs.” It’s the same sort of distinction as if you asked “do you like chicken” vs “do you like chickens?” Also, “crabs” has the unfortunate secondary meaning of crab lice.
“Octopus,” as above.
“An octopuses”? Did you not mean to say “an octopus”? “An octopuses” is wrong in any possible context. If I’m talking dinner, I would generally say “I want octopus.” If I’m talking pets, “I want an octopus.”
Do you have it.
Actually, this is somewhat interesting. I would say “shrimp,” and “crab,” but “prawns,” and “clams.”
I agree with the consensus that this should be “crab.”
That is correct, idiomatic English.
This rather depends on how octopus is served in the restaurant. If you anticipate getting, essentially, a single and mostly complete octopus on you plate (either whole, or cut up into parts), then I think you might very well say what you have here.
On the other hand, if you anticipate getting octopus parts comprising much less or much more than one whole octopus, or octopus parts taken from several different animals (or, indeed, several small octopuses) then you would say “I want octopus. Do you have it?” (or, if you have already seen it on the menu, or otherwise know that it is available, you might say "I want the octopus).
The flesh/meat of an animal (actually the substance of most food generally) is a mass noun. This means it doesn’t use a distinct plural form. It also means you generally don’t use an article with it, either. (A definite article is used when talking about an ingredient in a recipe or a particular dish you’re eating; see the bottom of this post.)
Thus:
“Do you like crab?”
“My father likes octopus.”
If you are referring specifically to the substance of the meat itself, it must always be this way. Colibri explained the exception for small items. ‘Shrimp’ is different because it’s already a mass noun, and it’s not standard to use ‘shrimps’.
When ordering from a menu, however, you’re generally referring to the entree. It’s okay to refer to what you’re ordering simply by naming the main ingredient. You can’t use an indefinite article in that case because you are specifying a single item (on the menu).
“I want octopus.” - Expresses a general desire for octopus meat. This is something you would say to your friends, indicating that you are going to look on the menu for an item featuring octopus. Saying it to the waiter might mean you want the chef to surprise you (if it’s that kind of restaurant). It’s slightly rude if not, as it appears you haven’t read the menu but just want octopus. The waiter will usually describe the dish and ask for confirmation if you make a request like this, even if there’s only one octopus entree.
“I want the octopus.” - How you would order if there is exactly one menu item featuring octopus.
Probably not the place to change it, but saying “I want” to a waiter comes off a bit demanding or childish. “I would like” is more polite, but it’s okay as above to say “I want octopus” to friends. (In Winnipeg’s “I’ll have” if you are ordering is polite as well, and would be especially more common if you’re ordering for someone else.)
“Do you have it?” This is slightly ambiguous. Either you are asking if they serve/have in stock octopus meat (mass noun, uses ‘it’), or you are asking about the specific menu item (singular noun, uses ‘it’). The previous sentence provides the context, but luckily the word is the same.
It would be informal to use ‘them’ here, because that would mean “Do you have the animal?”. In restaurants it’s a bit impolite to refer to the meat that way. Lobster or similar animals eaten fresh can be an exception, since you may be asking if they have the animals live in a tank for you to select from.
Here’s a relevant cite from a grammar textbook if I’m not convincing enough. Although the discussion of ‘crab’ here shows that ‘shellfish’ is not always non-count, at least in the US (it may be in Britain, though)
One other case that wasn’t specifically asked about. If you’re talking about a specific case of a food substance as an ingredient in a particular dish, you can use the definite article to refer to it. This is more common than using relative pronouns, when speaking about food one is eating.
“The octopus is perfectly seasoned.” - This is possibly referring to the meat here (mass noun). Identical in meaning to “This octopus is perfectly seasoned,” or “That octopus …”, depending on what you’ve just eaten. It could also be referring to the whole dish; if you talk about other ingredients in the dish, the distinction would be clear.
Similarly, a recipe might read, “Cover the octopus with the marinade.”
This is because it’s talking about the specific octopus meat (or whole octopus) that you’re using in the recipe. The same recipe may even contain the line “Octopus can be tricky to properly prepare.”
You invite your friends to a Crab Boil (a party of informal nature), where you boil lots of crabs, with Zatarains (commercial seasoning perfect in every detail), corn, small taters, and onion. Serve with cold beer. I didn’t see a crab big enough to make a whole meal until I was 30 or so…and that was at a casino buffet, imported from somewhere else. Maybe Alaska.
Octopus is bait in my world, so I dunno.
Shrimp can be bait or food, depending on size. But you’d order the fried shrimp, not the fried shrimps. Or Shrimp Jambalaya. Or a Shrimp Po-Boy. Any of those dishes will contain several shrimp.
Prawn is a word I never heard in times and places when I bought em off the boat at the dock. They were Jumbo Shrimp.
Crabs are the local delicacy where I live, and I know a bit of the ol’ nihongo and how the differences confuse us in both directions, so…
In this sentence, it could be either. The difference is pretty subtle and sometimes colloquial.
“do you like crab” is more likely to mean “do you like crab dishes in general”
“do you like crabs” is more likely to mean “do you like dishes where the crab is served intact”
You might think this is the same as (1) (except that the plural of octopus is octopi)m, but it is not. Not sure why, except maybe that “octopi” is a funny word no one uses, but if you say :my father likes octopus" it could refer to dishes where the octopus is either intact or not.
Probably you would say “I want octopus” because that refers to the general category of dish, not to the octopus itself. “An octopuses” mixes singular and plural, and has an incorrect plural also".
If you say “I want an octopus” you are probably referring to a pet for your aquarium. Same if you say “I want some octopii”. We just don’t use the plural for octopus dishes, even if they are tiny octopi.
Yes, you would say “I want an octopus. Do you have them”. The mismatch of singlular and plural here is because you are asking if the restaurant has "one or more octopi available, and if so you would like one.
BTW, probably “I would like” is a little more polite than “I want”. It is a slightly more indirect request, and hence more polite. Not unlike Japanese requests, who knew?
So:
Do you like shrimp? vs. Do you like shrimps?
The first refers to shrimp dishes in general, the second is probably not used, as above, but it does have a slang meaning unrelated to food.
“I would like shrimp. Do you have them”. Same as with octopus.
Do you like prawn? vs. Do you like prawns?
Opposite to shrimp! The first one is not used, but the second is. No slang issues here.
“I would like prawns. Do you have them”. Same as above, but this time “prawns” happens to be plural also.
Do you like clam? vs. Do you like clams?
First one means clam dishes in general, so does 2nd one!
“I would like clam. Do you have them?”
This doesn’t sound right to me. Maybe “Do you have clam dishes” would be clearer.
“I would like clams. Do you have them?” means you are probably asking about whole clams in their shells, but maybe a dish where the clam meat is not chopped up.
But there is the well known dish “Clams Casino”, so that is not always true either, e.g.:
“I would like clams. Do you have them?” “Yes, we have Clams Casino. Would you like some?”
A poll of opinions is not an effective approach to finding the best answer. It risks being a pooling of ignorance or a consensus of pedants. Re-read Colibri’s answer and order crab if you want crab meat culled from a variety of crabs or crab parts, crabs if you plan to have discrete animals placed on your plate, and crab claws if they are discrete but whole parts.
“An octopuses” obviously mixes singular and plural (I can only assume the “an” was a typo), but it does not have an incorrect plural. When an English word comes from another language, the plural can either be formed according to the rules of English (in this case, “octopuses”), or according to the rules of its original language (in this case, “octopodes”). Either is correct. There is not, however, any language where the plural of “octopus” is “octopi”, so that one is incorrect.
I stand corrected on the plural, but I am not so sure about the typo. The OP’s English is very good, but these questions have a distinctly Japanese flavor to me.
In particular, Japanese has:
no singular or plural
no definite or indefinite pronouns
exceedingly few irregular forms of words
English has all 3 in spades.
And so these are some of the most difficult aspects of learning English for Japanese. Toss in the fac that some of the answers are colloquial or regional and I am guessing that the questions, which seem simple, are not geared towards English 101 learners at all. The OP is asking about complex issues that confuse Japanese individually, let alone in combination.
If all that seems weird, consider that going in the other direction, as a Japanese learner you will be asking why you have to conjugate adjectives or be so sensitive to the relationship of the speaker to the listener and reflect it in seemingly every word.
In English, you don’t have any of that (or precious little of the latter anyway), but instead you have these other matters under discussion to trip you up.
Actual conversation with a bargirl in Madrid Bar, which serves food, in Bangkok’s Patpong red-light district after seeing a sign that said they would be serving “crabs” the next day:
ME: So you’ll have crabs tomorrow?
BG: Yes.
Me: Can I order it tonight?
BG: No, order tomorrow.
Me: Let me get this straight. You don’t have crabs right now?
BG: No, no have.
ME: So you’ll have crabs tomorrow?
BG: Yes.
Me: I can’t get them from you tonight?
BG: No, order tomorrow.
Me: Let me get this straight. You don’t have crabs right now?
BG: No, no have.
Which reminds me of this:
A crustacean walks into a bar. The bartender says: “Why so crabby?”
