pluralizer

Noun

pluralizer (plural pluralizers)

1. A syntactic marker that indicates something is plural; a plural marker.
   • In verbs, where it occupies suffix position 5, its occurrence as pluralizer of a third person expressed by a prefix is highly restricted; cf. 5.451. Instead, in verbs, it seems on the way to becoming a person marker (rather than a mere pluralizer) for the second person plural exclusive;1973, Hans Cristoph Wolfart, Plains Cree, page 49
   • The pluralizer is most frequently used with animate nouns, but this is not always the case, e.g. Nigerian PE 'dè nyám dḝm ' 'the yams'.2000, John Holm, An Introduction to Pidgins and Creoles, page 215
2. Someone or something that highlights or embodies plurality, diversity, or multiple perspectives; an agent or proponent of pluralism.
   • It is after all Freud—with his confusing picture of inversion's genealogy in the first few pages of the Three Essays, especially in footnotes added in 1910, 1915, and 1920—who can be considered the first pluralizer of homosexuality.2009, Leo Bersani, Homos, page 104
   • Such images, uncannily assimilating TV to the numinous, to angelic visitations, or even to death itself, graphically demonstrate the TV functions in postmodernism not just as one pluralizer among others, but as the figure of ontological plurality itself.2012, Brian McHale, Constructing Postmodernism, page 131