Quote:
Originally Posted by Titchou
Perhaps it has devolved to this but I took 3 years of Latin and was raised Catholic when everything was in Latin. That's how it was then.
And either way, she would never be "an alumni" as alumni is plural.
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Lol, ok no need to flash your Latin credentials at me.
Thing is your explanation is off for the romance languages as well, the gender doesn't reference the total population but the sample size that is being examined. Groups that contain one male and X females are referred to in the masculine, but never is a single female referred to in the masculine. I doubt that this changed over the past 50 years and suspect that you are remembering wrong as I am pretty confident that I'm right here. Can a MysticCat (or suitable facsimile) weigh in?
Wiki also notes that alumni is misused so frequently since most publications use the plural almost exclusively. Personally I prefer using alum as its gender neutral.
ETA: Lol again at "devolved." I kept looking it up in case it was 'old' usage (again, 50 years and less is not old for Latin) and the dictionaries all seem to agree with me)
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