Agenda

[David Myer]

I got onto this one by wondering what the plural of the word is. Surely it is already a plural, I thought, and the singular is presumably agendum.

And if it is a plural already, it surely doesn't mean a list of things to discuss/do. It means rather 'things to discuss'. So 'an agenda' is not strictly correct or rather 'pure'. It is corrupted. An agendum is a thing to do. Agenda is lots of things to do

Any thoughts on this?

Having posted this I have just picked up an earlier discussion here on criterion/criteria although that doesn't fully answer the question here. Data and criteria are technically misused as singular but they are now acceptable - to some. But no-one says datas or criterias. But agendas is often used. "This man is running several agendas." Surely "...several agenda" is sweeter? Although perhaps no-one can have two agenda. It is merely a longer single list. Two people can have different agenda. But a single-issue politician perhaps has only an agendum?

[tkowal]

My Latin is rather rusty but I checked on the web and confirmed that
agendus (plural agendi) is the masculine gerundive form of the verb agere, whereas agenda and agendum are the feminine and neutral forms with plurals agendae and agenda. Just a little more confusing.