Collective nouns: singular form, plural meaning

Gist. Collective nouns of the first type (family, team, government, committee, army, party) are singular in form but name a group. When its members are meant, the verb and pronoun can be plural, especially in British English: The committee are divided. Collectives of the second type (people, cattle, police, clergy, vermin) are always plural in meaning: these people, a hundred people. Conditions and exceptions. Number in UD follows the word form, not the meaning: family has Sing even with are. So subject–predicate agreement cannot be checked strictly for collectives. People "nation" has the plural peoples. Examples. My family is/are here.; The police have arrived.; Many people were there. In UD. people — NOUN NNS Number=Plur (EWT 2.18: 315 of 316). Police is annotated inconsistently (15 times NNS Plur, 11 — NN Sing). Collectives of the first type — NN Sing. Sources. Poutsma GLME vol. 3, Ch. XXVI §6–7 (books/p/po/poutsma-1904-grammar-late-modern-english/text-3.md, pp. 300–301 = book pp. 280–281); Poutsma GLME vol. 3, Ch. XXV §27–28 (people, cattle; pp. 266–270); Curme 1931 §8 1 d and Ch. XXVI "Collective Nouns" (books/c/cu/curme-1931-grammar-english-language-vol/text-1.md, pp. 50, 539).

rule: en.nominal.people-plural
what: people meaning "persons" is plural (NNS, Number=Plur)
match: n[upos=NOUN, form=people, !feats.Typo]
require: n[xpos=NNS, feats.Number=Plur]
severity: warn
source: Poutsma GLME III Ch. XXV §28 (people — plural in all respects)

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