Re: inch/inches

[Linda Bergmann <bergmann@umr.edu>]

Inch is functioning as an adjective (or at least as part of one, i.e., "six
inch" is the adjective)  in "six inch fish" and as a noun in "The fish was
six inches long."  

At 03:29 PM 10/28/99 -0500, you wrote:
>
>     I don't know such details by name. It seems to me that it's because of 
>the 
>     parenthetical. Here "inches" refers more to the length than the object.
>     
>     After all, you'd say he caught a fish which was six inches long. And 
>you'd 
>     say a three inch lobster.
>     
>     Am I in left field?
>
>
>______________________________ Reply Separator 
>_________________________________
>Subject: inch/inches 
>Author:  <wcenter@ttacs6.ttu.edu > at internet
>Date:    10/28/1999 3:22 PM
>
>
>Dear Grammarians,
>     
>On a paper a student wrote:  The lobster (three and a half inch) was too 
>small  to meet the legal limit. 
>     
>When the Instructor said that the student should use "inches" instead of 
>inch (because it was plural), the student disagreed and cited the following 
>example: I caught a six inch fish.
>     
>Why is inch singular when is comes before the noun, yet plural when it 
>comes after: The fish was six inches long?  Can you help?
>     
>     
>Assistant Professor of English
>UMA/UCB
>262-7753
>     
>     


Linda S. Bergmann
Associate Professor of English and Director of Writing Across the Curriculum
University of Missouri-Rolla
Rolla, MO  65409

(573) 341-4685

bergmann@umr.edu