Status in the plural

MAY I know whether the word “status” has a plural form(s)? I found “statuses” and “stati” online. However, I’m not sure it they are the correct forms to use. – Ng Pei Fang

The word “status” is a countable noun in most of its meanings and does have a plural form, “statuses”, although this is seldom used. The Oxford English Dictionary documents the use of “statuses” more than once, for example in the following sentence:

1977 R. Holland Self & Social Context v. 89 Occupants of similar statuses may support each other against threats from members of a role-set, as when teachers support each other against parents of their students. More recently, the online Daily Telegraph used it on March 30 in the following sentence:

Greg Hands, the Conservatives’ Treasury spokesman, said: “For weeks Labour politicians have been calling for more information about people’s tax statuses and offshore tax havens, but clearly Tony Blair believes he can keep things secret.”

The article ‘the’

MY friend and I were travelling on the LRT and we were discussing whether there was something grammatically wrong with the words on a sign which read “Do not lean against doors”. I thought it should be “Do not lean against THE door” since without the “the”, it seemed like a generalisation to not lean against any doors. – Jacky

You are right about the sentence “Do not lean against doors” being a generalisation, and the definite article “the” ought to be used to specify that the doors meant are the doors in the compartment where the sign is.

I haven’t travelled by LRT recently and I can’t recall whether there is a sign near every door. If there is, then your suggestion “Do not lean against THE door” is correct, but if there is only one sign in a compartment, “Do not lean against THE doors” should be used, since there are at least two doors in one compartment.

Family is single unit

MY Standard Four daughter’s teacher has marked the following sentence as wrong: “Muthu’s family celebrates Deepavali every year.” Instead, she says it should be “Muthu’s family celebrate Deepavali every year.” I believe that this is incorrect as the family is considered a singular unit. – Elaine

I agree with you that your daughter’s sentence is correct, since “family” there is considered a single unit.

Ethnicity of deceased When referring to the qualities or profession of a deceased person, we use the past tense. However, when speaking about the person’s ethnicity, I tend to use the present tense, for example, “My father is Indian”. Should it be “My father was Indian” instead? – Jack Sprat

We speak of a deceased person’s ethnicity in the past also, although I know from experience how hard it is to speak of our parents in the past.

Here is a quotation from the Internet. It comes from the website of the 2004 BBC series on personal family histories called “Who Do You Think You Are”:

“My father was Scottish, my mother was English, but came from Jersey, I was born in Wales but left after five months ...”