I've never heard about Joni Mitchell and 1975 (40th anniversary!), that's simply amazing!A collective noun is a collection of things taken as a whole. For example, in the phrase "a pride of lions," pride is a collective noun.
For some time, the accepted term for an admirer of Leonard Cohen has been “Cohenite.” The earliest reference I’ve found for this usage of the term is Joni Mitchell’s declaration in 1975, “I’m a stone Cohenite.” (Source: On the Road With Bob Dylan by Larry Ratso Sloman. Three Rivers Press; Revised edition: August 27, 2002)
Recently, Eileen Cockcroft opened Facebook Group thread with the question, “What is a good name for a collective noun of Leonard Cohen fans?” This led to an extended discussion with several terms suggested in response.
Fellow fans, let's start the discussion on this page as well – what do you think?
Allan Showalter a.k.a. DrHGuy at Cohencentric.com
My question is: how do you pronounce this word?
When I had a pleasure to meet Chrissie and Kevin in Saint Petersburg, we've discussed many Cohenesque topics, including this one.
So I learned the English way to pronounce: "Cohenight".
Here, in Russia we use another (a la French) variant: "Coheneet".