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ET AL. |
“Et al.’ is a scholarly abbreviation of the Latin phrase et alia, which means “and others.” It is commonly used when you don’t want to name all the people or things in a list, and works in roughly the same way as “etc.” “The reorganization plan was designed by Alfred E. Newman, General Halftrack, Zippy the Pinhead, et al.; and it was pretty useless.” The “al.” in this phrase needs a period after it to indicate it is an abbreviation of alia; but it is incorrect to follow “et” with a period.