-ers

See also: ers, ERs, and ERS

English

Etymology

Etymology tree

English -er

English -ers

From -er.

Suffix

-ers

1. (informal, originally school slang) Used to form slang or colloquial equivalents of words.

   ‎breakfast + ‎-ers → ‎brekkers

   ‎divinity + ‎-ers → ‎divvers (“the study of religion”)

2. (informal, originally school slang) Used to form mostly adjectives used informally.

Derived terms

English terms suffixed with -ers

Anagrams

• SRE, ser., res., ESR, res, RSE, ser, Res., RES, SER

Afrikaans

Etymology

From Dutch -ers, a chiefly dialectal plural morpheme equivalent to standard Dutch -eren (whence Afrikaans -ere).

Pronunciation

• Audio:

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Suffix

-ers

1. forms the plural of three nouns, all of which denote young creatures

   kind (“child”) — kinders (“children”)

   kalf (“calf”) — kalwers (“calves”)

   lam (“lamb”) — lammers (“lambs”)

Usage notes

• The colloquial plurale tantum goeters (“things, stuff”) is only etymologically an inflection of goed (“a good”), whose true plural is goedere.
• Two other Afrikaans nouns are backformations from plurals originally using the suffix -ers: eier (“egg”, from Dutch ei) and hoender (“chicken”, from Dutch hoen).