Learn English – people are/is: which one is correct

collective-nounsgrammatical-numbernounsverb-agreement

I have been confused for so long about the plural and singular forms of "people". I want to put an end to this confusion.

What is the difference between these following expressions, and is it correct to use these expressions in both their singular and plural forms?

    • "The German people are not warlike"

    • "The German people is not warlike"

(As in "The German people is no warlike nation. It is a soldierly one, which means it does not want a war but does not fear it….")

    • "People are funny"

    • "People is funny"

Here I suppose that "people is" referring to a population/community: "the German people is not warlike" = "the German population is not warlike" and "People is funny" = "population is funny".

Is this correct? If it is correct, then what does "people are" mean?

Best Answer

The word people is predominantly plural (see Merriam-Webster's top definitions), although it can be singular.

According to this source (a Pearson Education Q&A),

In the PLURAL sense, people is used as the plural of person very frequently. It is a plural count noun and takes a plural verb. It never has an -s ending; it is already plural.

Most of the time, people will be plural; and as far as I can tell, you will never see the phrase people is--at least, not in a grammatically correct sentence.

Here is what that same source has to say of the singular people:

the SINGULAR sense of people is used to refer to ALL the men, women, and children of a particular tribe, nation, country or ethnic group, speaking of them as a UNIT, and so the phrase a great people is indeed singular. It is a singular count noun.

(Okay, people is appears as a phrase in that quotation, but is refers to phrase and not people.)

People, even when singular, should always take are.

For more on whether to use is or are, please visit the Online Writing Lab.