vernacular - Pluralisation of Latin Words





Which style of Latin plurals should I use?
Is “data” considered singular or plural?
Where are the "data"? I only have one "datum".



Listening to Radio 4's Today programme this morning I was struck by how the journalists, commentators, politicians and other obviously very well educated people are happy to use referendums as the plural of referendum. This grates on me - I was always told such Latin words, when pluralised, ended in 'a' and, being working-class, I tend to regard these kinds of people as models of good behaviour and speech (yes I know). Other usages that grate are referenda, data (plural of datum) and, in our football-obsessed times, the ubiquitous stadia (plural of stadium) and many, many more.


Should I just accept the fact that the world is changing and embrace what to me are very ugly examples of modern English or are these people, in the strictest sense wrong?




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