"What's the plural of sister-in-law?"
The plural of sister-in-law is sisters-in-law.
Definition of sister-in-law:
Sister-in-law is a term used to refer to the sister of one's spouse or the wife of one's sibling. It is a term commonly used in many cultures around the world and is often included in family trees and genealogy charts.
When it comes to discussing multiple sisters-in-law, many people may wonder what the correct plural form of sister-in-law is.
Forming the Plural of Hyphenated Compound Words
The general rule to form the plural of hyphenated compound nouns is to change only the primary noun to its plural form.
This is because the primary noun is the most important part of the noun phrase, and changing it to its plural form creates the appropriate number agreement for the noun phrase as a whole.
For example, in the case of "daughter-in-law", the primary noun is "daughter", so we pluralize it to "daughters-in-law" to indicate that there are multiple daughters in law.
Similarly, in the case of "editor-in-chief", the primary noun is "editor", so we pluralize it to "editors-in-chief" to indicate that there are multiple editors in chief.
In the case of "light-year" however, the primary noun is "year", so the plural form is "light-years" as the second word is pluralized.
This is why the plural of “sister-in-law” is “sisters-in-law” since the primary noun is “sister”.
Plural of Sister-in-law Example Sentences
Here are three example sentences each of the singular and plural forms of sister-in-law:
Singular:
- My sister-in-law is a talented artist and I love visiting her studio.
- Sarah's husband has a younger sister who is her new sister-in-law.
- I'm very close to my sister-in-law and we often go shopping together.
Plural:
- Both of my sisters-in-law are coming to the wedding next month.
- Sarah has three sisters-in-law, two from her husband's side and one from her brother's.
- I went on a trip to Europe with my sisters-in-law and we had a great time.
