Is media singular or plural?: Usage Guide
The singular media and its plural medias seem to have originated in the field of advertising over 70 years ago; they are still so used without stigma in that specialized field. In most other applications media is used as a plural of medium. The popularity of the word in references to the agencies of mass communication is leading to the formation of a mass noun, construed as a singular.
Edwin Meese 3d
James Lewis, Guardian Weekly
This use is not as well established as the mass-noun use of data and is likely to incur criticism especially in writing.
media
3 of 3plural of medium
Examples of media in a Sentence
TIME, 29 Apr. 2024
The 11-year-old was shot dead Friday by his older brother at their home in St. Petersburg, the St. Petersburg Police Department said in a social media post Friday.
—USA TODAY, 29 Apr. 2024
As his social media page indicates, Cooper is not lacking for confidence.
—Kirk Kenney, San Diego Union-Tribune, 27 Apr. 2024
On Wednesday, April 24, the California Highway Patrol’s Santa Fe Springs office shared a social media post showing how a motorist recently tried to pull a fast one on them by using a dummy as a passenger to avoid heavy traffic.
—Angel Saunders, Peoplemag, 27 Apr. 2024
The Arizona Corporation Commission that oversees railroad safety said in a social media post on X that 10 rail cars were involved in the derailment and that two were transporting liquid petroleum.
—CBS News, 27 Apr. 2024
The wheels were zip-tied, but during their layover in Chicago, the ground crew cut the zip ties, according to a social media post Walker and Shields posted to Instagram.
—The Arizona Republic, 26 Apr. 2024
One popular social media post shows two photographs of a mother and her child taken 40 years apart.
—Sarah Quiñones Wolfson, Los Angeles Times, 25 Apr. 2024
With the prospective jurors out of the courtroom, the judge told both sides that Trump had been audibly muttering and gesturing during the questioning of a prospective juror over a social media post.
—Bart Jansen, USA TODAY, 17 Apr. 2024
These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'media.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
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Cite this Entry
“Media.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/media. Accessed 2 May. 2024.
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