Genitive plural of "человек"

[lilith35]

Hello everyboy!
As far as I know, the genitive plural of the word "человек" is "людей", right? Then why do they say "несколько человек"? Is it genitive?
Thanks

[Taras]

Hello everyboy!

Lilith, it's so sweet of you to greet every boy, but I think girls are worth greeting too .

As for your question, yes, the genitive plural of 'человек' is 'людей'. However, the collocation 'несколько человек' is much more wide-spread than 'несколько людей'. The phrases 'мало человек' and 'мало людей' are approximately equally common, as well as the phrases 'много человек' and 'много людей', 'немного человек' and 'немного людей'. If we add an adjective (or several adjectives) and/or an adverb (or several adverbs), we use only 'людей':

(несколько/мало/много/немного) молодых людей (not '(несколько/мало/много/немного) молодых человек'),
(несколько/мало/много/немного) молодых работающих умных успевших на поезд людей.

After a specific number you should use 'человек':
1 человек
5 человек
6 человек
7 человек...

The exceptions are '2 человека', '3 человека', '4 человека'.

All (or almost all) the other nouns are used
[*] in the nominative singular after 1:
1 машина/друг
[*] in the genitive singular after 2, 3, 4:
(2/3/4) машины/друга
[*] in the genitive plural after 5, 6, 7, ... or after a quantifier which doesn't express a specific number:
(5/6/7/.../несколько/мало/много/немного/...) машин/друзей.

P.S. I have edited my previous post (created on 24 March 2015) to clarify the usage of '(несколько/мало/много/немного) (людей/человек)'.

[lilith35]

Everybody (sorry)
Thanks a lot for the explanation taras!

[calzzetin]

As for your question, yes, the genitive plural of 'человек' is 'людей'. However, after a quantifier which doesn't express a specific number 'людей' is used a bit more commonly:

'(несколько/мало/много/немного) людей'
is a bit preferable than
'(несколько/мало/много/немного) человек'.

After a specific number you should use 'человек':
1 человек
5 человек
6 человек
7 человек...

Everything regarding numbers in Russian is both interesting and difficult!

So both "много дюдей" and "много человек" are possible to use?

And about specific numbers, is it incorrect if I say "6 людей"?

[alena149]

Hello)

omg, i'm russian and i have no idea. "много человек" just doesn't sound well, but "несколько человек" is all right and actually better than "несколько людей".
*as for me, i usually use "народ" instead of "человек" or "люди" with "мало/много/немного" (много народу).

yes, it is. and after any numeral we say человек/человека

[Taras]

Yes, I think that after a specific number 'людей' is incorrect and only 'человек' (or 'человека') is correct:

'6 человек' (not '6 людей').

[calzzetin]

Russian is definitely a complex language