Uniform: countable or uncountable?
Hello, the word "uniform" is confusing to me. I looked it up and found out that it can be used both countable and uncountable, but I don't know when and how to use it. Can I say:
- Students are wearing their uniforms.
- Students are wearing their uniform.
- I'm wearing a uniform.
- I'm wearing uniform.
Please help! Thanks so much 🙆🏻♀️
Recherche parmi différents professeurs en Anglais…
Réponses · 6
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Both C and U, mostly U.
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@all: thanks so much for helping me!
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You can use all of those. You have a lot of flexibility with uniform as a noun. You can also use, as Paul indicates "They are in uniform."
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Rather than 'I'm wearing uniform', you would say 'I'm in uniform'. For example, we refer to 'a police officer in uniform' to distinguish them from a police officer in plain clothes. Saying that someone is 'In uniform' will be understood to mean that they are wearing uniform.
Your confusion may be because 'uniform' is a noun (with the meaning of a type of clothing outfit) derived from an adjective. As an adjective, it really means uniform outfits of clothing, ie outfits that have 'one form', or a single style. (I'm sure you will know that uni- means one, as in University, unicycle, and unicorn). So its countable when used as a noun, but uncountable when used as an adjective. In your second and fourth examples, its used as an adjective, with the noun (clothing, or outfit) implied.
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Uniform without the 's' at the end gives the sense of a unitary dress code. With the 's' is also a dress code, but shows that there are different types. The word is almost always used with a modifier (a, the, his, her, my, etc.).
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