In the last year I have become aware that people in the UK call Mathematics, Maths.
At first, I thought it was a joke or something. I was watching a spoof documentary on youtube set in england about the british school system ( or something.) Can’t remember. Not important.
My entire life, here in the states, it has been (and should be) Math.
Maths just seems WRONG. It is plural.
Did I miss something vital in my youth. Is** Maths**, which is so VERY wrong, actually the correct way to say you are studying this specific subject?
HELP ME OBI WAN!!!
Well, yeah, if you’re in the UK, Australia, or New Zealand. But if that’s where you are, you’d be driving on the wrong side of the road or standing upside down at the bottom of the earth, and “maths” would be the least of your worries.
“Statistics” actually is plural (or at least it can be). Do you silly people who use the word “maths” think of “mathematics” as plural? What is a mathematic?
I’ve studied a little economics, and never heard it referred to as either “econ” on “econs”. (I’ve also studied maths and some stats).
“Economics”, “mathematics” and “politics” are usually treated as singular nouns, as is “statistics” when it’s the name of a discipline. Of these, only “statistics” has a commonly used singular “statistic”, because “statistics” can mean either a collection of numerical data, or the discipline used to study and analyse such numerical data: in the first sense, it’s plural, and in the second sense it’s singular.
Right – I have heard “econ” used occasionally as an adjective, but not as a noun. However, I would use “maths” and “stats” as adjectives as well as nouns – “maths textbook” or “stats exam”. Is that completely logical? Perhaps not, but it’s what sounds right to me.
At some point while crossing the Atlantic, the English language seems to have undergone a pluralectomy. Maths became math, “parliament are discussing whatever”* became “parliament is discussing whatever”. And I’m sure there are other examples but I got caught up in my rage at the prior one.
*I hate this. I hate this so very much. I cannot for the life of me justify it, but the British practice of treating collective nouns as plurals drives me absolutely insane. I know it happens sometimes in American English, I know it’s completely illogical to let a tiny little grammatical quick inspire rage, but I completely and totally despise this construction. If you were to ask me, “limited to the realm of English grammar what is the worst thing in the universe, ever,” I would without a doubt say, “why, it’s the intolerable practice of regularly treating collective nouns as plurals. Why must the English do such awful things to their own language?” Seriously, it’s awful and to American ears it’s the worst sound in the universe, and we have more guns and a greater inclination to use them than you British and Australians and New Zealanders and whoever else does it, so you better stop that right now.
Wouldn’t “econ” as in “an econ major” (= a person majoring in Economics) still be a noun, not an adjective?
If an English major is a major who is English, “English” is an adjective, but if an English major is someone who is majoring in English, wouldn’t it be a noun?
