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Grammar Check: Persons vs People

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29 May 2017

By Bronwen

English grammar is hard and more so when we have two different words for “people” that no one really knows the difference between. Whether it’s for your own personal learning or revision for an English exam, you may be looking up some of those abstract grammar terms to try and make sense of them. Well to save you the bother of the whole people/persons problem, we’ve explained it very basically here.

‘Persons’ used to be the plural form of ‘person’ and it still is. Only today, you’d only really find it in legal texts. For example, on forms or in some shops you may see text that reads, “All persons under the age of eighteen must…”. Grammatically, it would be correct to say ‘people’ but it’s just not used in legislative text. Persons is a very formal and serious term.

To refer to actual, real groups of humans, you always use people.  For example, “Those people are nice”.

Also, if you want to make a general statement about the human race, you use people. For example, “People just don’t care”. In both these situations, to say ‘persons’ would be inaccurate.

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