Korean Job Discussion Forums

[brento1138]

So, I heard from another teacher that saying "less friends" or "less people" in any sentence is incorrect. It should always be "fewer." But is this correct? I thought that saying "less friends" is fine...

How can I check into this?

[PigeonFart]

Hi,

I can't tell you the answer because i don't know. In fact, i'd guess that most english speakers don't know.

But i'm pretty sure there's a pedantic person out there who cares about such matters, and he's just the kind of person who would have "less" or "fewer" friends.

sorry i couldn't answer your question.

[ajosshi]

[Draz]

[brento1138]

Cool, thanks everyone!

[mmstyle]

Fewer. Countable nouns. Draz, no disrespect, but most people I know don't say less, even in spoken English. But maybe it's just because I correct them. It's a peeve of mine. Like people who say "lieberry" instead of "library."

Hmmm, thinking of a thread.

[oldtrafford]

And you need to take a chill pill for goodness sake. Do you go around saying 'what's up'?

[garybliss123]

[oldtrafford]

Too rate Gary la!

[Darkeru]

I want to say less. Reading fewer seems okay, but saying it sounds like I'm quoting a textbook.

One thing my TESOL teacher used to say is that if everyone says it, it's the correct way, even if the grammar is wrong.

[Reise-ohne-Ende]

No, seriously. "Fewer" vs. "less" is a big pet peeve of a LOT of educated people. I'm all for descriptive linguistics, but you should *not* be teaching Korean students that "less people" is okay, because it isn't.

Countable nouns use 'many', 'few', and 'fewer':

How many carrots do you want?
Not too many. Just a few.
I want fewer carrots than she has.

Uncountable nouns use 'much', 'little', and 'less':

How much milk do you want?
Not too much. Just a little.
I want less milk than she has.

If you wouldn't say, "How much people were there?" then you shouldn't say "There were less people than yesterday." 'Person' is a countable noun, therefore you should use 'many', 'few', and 'fewer'.

ETA: No one I know says, "Less people came to school today." If anything, people usually say things like, "Not as many people...". If I heard "less people", my first instinct would be to assume that the person was uneducated. Which doesn't mean they're wrong (all native English speakers are by definition speaking English correctly), but those forms are not the ones we should be teaching second language learners.

[jinks]

[winterfall]

[sirius black]

I don't think its right to teach common speech that is grammatically incorrect as if its correct.

The student needs to be told that the common way is not grammatically correct if it isn't. When that student takes a grammar test in English they will get it wrong. Its unfair to the student.

[winterfall]