Talk:ребят

Can you verify the usage note that I just wrote? Benwing2 (talk) 00:39, 25 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Wouldn't it be a pain adding usage notes to each inflected form? Also, the case order is normally - N, G, D, A, I, P, (L). --Anatoli T. (обсудить/вклад) 01:21, 25 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Not such a big deal as there are only five of them. But I'm confused ... it currently says it can mean "children" but not be the plural of "child". Which is it? Benwing2 (talk) 01:26, 25 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Changed. Not just five, all -ята/-ата plurals are grammatical neuters. --Anatoli T. (обсудить/вклад) 01:52, 25 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Hmmm. I'm not going to add those usage notes to all such forms, but ребята is a very common word, and it's confusing enough to me that I think the usage notes might be warranted. Benwing2 (talk) 01:56, 25 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Russian -ята/-ата plurals are suppletive, cf котёнок -> котята, поросёнок -> поросята and they all change from masculines to neuters in the plural. It makes much more sense in Ukrainian, e.g. кошеня -> кошенята, порося -> поросята, where baby animals are neuters and so are their plural forms. --Anatoli T. (обсудить/вклад) 02:37, 25 January 2016 (UTC)
 * BTW how do we know that ребята and others are neuter not masculine, other than that they end in -а? Adjective agreement doesn't show gender in the plural. Benwing2 (talk) 02:39, 25 January 2016 (UTC)
 * 1. Genitive plural lacks -ов. 2. Pre-reform feminine/neuter plural nominatives were -ыя, not -ые (e.g. молодыя женщины), hence "молодыя котята" was the correct form before 1918. --Anatoli T. (обсудить/вклад) 02:49, 25 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Please see my comment for ребята. It's still a plural form of "child" sense (even if a less common one). --Anatoli T. (обсудить/вклад) 04:07, 25 January 2016 (UTC)