NumberPlural

NumberPlural is a grammatical category that marks nouns, pronouns, adjectives, and sometimes verbs to indicate reference to more than one entity. It is a component of grammatical number, typically contrasted with singular. Across languages, the form and triggers of NumberPlural are diverse. In English, most count nouns form a plural by adding a suffix such as -s or -es (cat -> cats), with some irregular forms (foot -> feet). In many other languages, plural marking can be realized by affixes, stem changes, internal vowel alternations, or separate words, and some languages employ zero plural where the form is identical to the singular. Some languages also distinguish dual (two), paucal (a few), or multiple plural categories; in such systems, NumberPlural interplays with numerals and classifiers.

In computational linguistics and localization, NumberPlural is treated as a locale-specific set of plural forms. Pluralization rules determine which plural form to use based on the number and the language; libraries such as ICU or CLDR provide mappings. For example, English typically uses a single plural form for quantities greater than one, while other languages may require different forms for one, two, many, and other categories.

Examples: cat -> cats; in Arabic, plural forms vary by count and can involve distinct word patterns; in Russian, different stems appear for quantities of one, two to four, and five or more.

Notes: The term NumberPlural is used here to describe the general concept of plurality marking across languages; it is not always a single, formal label in linguistic traditions. See also singular, plural, dual, paucal, pluralization, locale.

---