Plurality of computers?
It's very easy in English. In the majority of cases, the word “computer” is simply followed by an “s”. So you say “one computer” and “two computers”. In German, plural formation is generally a bit more complicated. But there are rules here that you can remember.
The majority of English foreign words in German
The German language has taken over many foreign words that come from English. The formation of the plural is usually easy.
- Plural forms with an appended "s" are not common in German. However, since more and more English-language words have found their way into German usage, this plural form is now found relatively often - analogous to the plural form in English. So it's called the drink - the drinks, the job - the jobs, the chat - the chats, the scan - the scans.
- Please note that with a word ending with "y" the English-language plural formation in German is not adopted. So please write “the babies” and “the parties” and not “the babies” and “the parties”.
- Even with so-called acronyms, i.e. abbreviations that are formed from the initial letters of several words, simply an "s" is appended. So you say “the CDs” (actually: Compact Discs) and “the DVDs” (Digital Versatile Discs).
The exception to the rule - the plural formation of computers
Even if you hear it this way on occasion, the majority of the word “computer” is not “computers”. Another grammatical rule of thumb applies here.
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- Foreign words that have been used very frequently and for a long time in German often conform to the German word formation rules. This includes the word “computer”, which remains unchanged in the plural form. So it is correctly called “the computer” (singular) and “the computer” (plural).
- That corresponds to a simple rule in German. Nouns that end in "er" and whose gender (the grammatical gender) is masculine or neuter, mostly remain unchanged. So singular and plural are the same. Other examples of this are: the teacher - the teacher, the error - the errors, the window - the windows.
- It is also handled with the plural formation of other foreign words that end in "er", for example: the calendar - the calendar, the container - the container.
- The situation is different if you create the acronym “PC” from the word “personal computer”. Analogous to the rule already mentioned for the plural formation of acronyms, an "s" is appended in the plural - it must read: "one PC" and "several PCs".
Even if the plural formation of foreign words in German has its pitfalls: You can avoid mistakes with these simple rules.
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