General Question

Hawaii_Jake's avatar

What is the correct way to write a plural of a letter of the alphabet?

Asked by Hawaii_Jake (37734points) May 8th, 2020

I’ve seen the plural of letters of the alphabet written as

Us
U’s
/U/s

just to demonstrate a few. Is there a correct way to write a plural of a letter? Is there an accepted way?

Observing members: 0 Composing members: 0

8 Answers

janbb's avatar

Oh goody! Jeruba’s on it!

Jeruba's avatar

It’s a matter of style, not rule. Most of the publishers I’ve worked for follow this model:

I got all A’s.

Demosthenes's avatar

Although we don’t mark plurals of words with apostrophe-s (a common mistake I see: “potato’s and tomato’s for sale!”), in the case of individual letters, not using an apostrophe can make it confusing (like you wrote, is it the word “us” capitalized or multiples of the letter U?), so an apostrophe is often used. The apostrophe here is to aid comprehension. It may be okay to not use an apostrophe if the intended meaning is clear.

Caravanfan's avatar

It’s the Oakland A’s. I have a hat to prove it.

(Let’s go Oakland! clap, clap, clap-clap clap)

zenvelo's avatar

I use the spelling of the letter. Two ayes three bees,, four aitches.five wyes.

Yellowdog's avatar

I agree with @Jeruba —this is the way its taught in journalism and creative writing,

Lonelyheart807's avatar

I write “A’s”, “B’s”, etc.

Response moderated (Spam)

Answer this question

Login

or

Join

to answer.

This question is in the General Section. Responses must be helpful and on-topic.

Your answer will be saved while you login or join.

Have a question? Ask Fluther!

What do you know more about?
or
Knowledge Networking @ Fluther