Search results for 'tag:Singular nouns tag:Constructions' matching tags 'Singular nouns' and 'Constructions'

Re: there is/are going to

Chariot — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 12:05:41 GMT

Thanks everyone. Now I understand that in the "There be" construction, the BE and other verbs that take the place of BE are the main verbs, and the nouns following them agree with them.

Originally I thought "going to do" can be followed by either plural nouns or singular nouns because "do" stands for a verb infinitive. In the case of the verb "be", its infinitive is BE, which is not affected by the countabilitity of the noun that follows. On this basis, the BE in the "there be" and the noun phrase do not necessarily accord, as "going to be" stands between them and both singular and plural nouns are allowed after "be". Therefore I could not find agreement between "there be" and the nouns when "goin to be" comes in between.

Re: Correct if needed

Cool Breeze — Sun, 14 Oct 2007 09:10:31 GMT

Mister Micawber wrote:

Here where I live, we deal with those kinds of incidents almost EVERY DAY.

Kind has two plurals, the old unchanged kind and the newer kinds. The original plural can still be used in the expressions these/those kind of:

" âUsage. The phrase THESE (or THOSE) KIND OF, followed by a plural noun (these kind of flowers; those kind of shoes) is frequently condemned as ungrammatical because it is said to combine a plural demonstrative (these; those) with a singular noun, KIND. Historically, KIND is an unchanged or unmarked plural noun like deer, folk, sheep, and swine, and the construction THESE KIND OF is an old one, occurring in the writings of Shakespeare, Swift, Jane Austen, and, in modern times, Jimmy Carter and Winston Churchill. KIND has also developed the plural KINDS, evidently because of the feeling that the old pattern was incorrect. THESE KIND OF nevertheless persists in use, esp. in less formal speech and writing. In edited, more formal prose, THIS KIND OF and THESE KINDS OF are more common. SORT OF has been influenced by the use of KIND as an unchanged plural: these sort of books. This construction too is often considered incorrect and appears mainly in less formal speech and writing.
KIND (or SORT) OF as an adverbial modifier meaning âsomewhatâ occurs in informal speech and writing: Sales have been kind (or sort) of slow these last few weeks."
- Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary

"The Unchanged Plural

Many substantives are unchanged in the plural, either always or in certain employments.

---

In the familiart these kind of tools, those sort of speeches, we may look upon kind and sort as unchanged plurals; but there is a tendency to treat kind of and sort of as inseparable units; cp. the vulgar kind of before a verb: 'I kind of admire her.' In literary style books of that kind is preferred to those kind of books.

In that kind of thing we have a survival of the old unchanged plural, thing."
- Otto Jespersen, Essentials of English Grammar

This usage is one of countless similar controversial points of grammar. The following quote is from the Collins Concise Dictionary:

"The mixture of plural and singular constructions, although often used informally with kind and sort, should be avoided in serious writing: children enjoy those kinds (not those kind) of stories; these sorts of (not these sort) of distinctions are becoming blurred."

There is disagreement. I am inclined to think that those who compiled the Collins Dictionary may have been born about the same year Churchill died (1965) and thus were unaware of what he said and wrote. If the plural kind is totally rejected, the same logic could be applied to all unchanged plurals that have been used for ages. The choice is yours; I am a traditionalist and therefore I like old plurals.

CB

Re: Use of "an" before a plural, modified noun

Clive — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 22:01:25 GMT

Hi,

Why do we say "He will pay her for an extra two hours of work" when "two hours" is obviously plural?" "I'll take an extra dozen." "It will accommodate an additional three persons."

In this kind of construction, we are thinking of 'two hours of work' as a single 'amount of work', and three persons' as 'a single group of people'. That's why we say 'an extra two hours of work' rather than 'two extra hours of work'.

The word 'dozen' is a singular noun. We can count dozens.

Best wishes, Clive

Re: Is this noun singular or plural?

Goodman — Tue, 10 Apr 2007 17:36:38 GMT

CalifJim wrote:

There is are a lot of questions which need/ ~~needs~~ to be answered.¹

There ~~was /~~ ~~were~~ was a great deal of confusions at that momentâ¦..²

There ~~was~~ were a few among us who still believed ~~/believes~~ that â¦â¦³
___________________

¹'a lot of' is number transparent. Make the agreement with questions.

² 'a great deal of' can only be followed by singular noun. The agreeing verb must take this into account.

³ 'a few' is not number transparent. It is inherently plural. Make the agreement with the plural 'a few'. Tense agreement would make for a smoother effect here as well.

^{1, 2, 3} All three of these use the there construction. In these the verb after there must agree with the relevant noun which follows the verb.

CJ

Thanks CJ,

You know, I must have misunderstood or been taught the substandard English grammar early on.

All the âtransparentâ phrases, as you called them, were in my mind of singular in nature. i.e. there is a lot/ a few / great deal/ plenty ofâ¦etc..

What got me was the âaâ which lead me to think of it as âoneâ and therefore associated with âthere isâ. Thanks for straightening me out!

Re: Is this noun singular or plural?

CalifJim — Tue, 10 Apr 2007 07:26:58 GMT

There is are a lot of questions which need/ ~~needs~~ to be answered.¹

There ~~was /~~ ~~were~~ was a great deal of confusions at that momentâ¦..²

There ~~was~~ were a few among us who still believed ~~/believes~~ that â¦â¦³
___________________

¹'a lot of' is number transparent. Make the agreement with questions.

² 'a great deal of' can only be followed by singular noun. The agreeing verb must take this into account.

³ 'a few' is not number transparent. It is inherently plural. Make the agreement with the plural 'a few'. Tense agreement would make for a smoother effect here as well.

^{1, 2, 3} All three of these use the there construction. In these the verb after there must agree with the relevant noun which follows the verb.

Re: Some questions

Philip — Wed, 28 Mar 2007 17:05:38 GMT

Anonymous wrote:

Please answer the following questions:

1. Why the word 'police' does not have a determiner in front of it when my dictionary noted that it could be a singular noun?

... identified by police and parents as the day-care center owner... 'the' could be used, but is often omitted.

2. Is the following adjectival construction acceptable?

... 24 members of a University California, Irvine, rowing crew were ...Acts as an adjective modifyin 'a.....crew'.

3. When you have abbrviations like IRS or NBC, don't you (usually??) put the article 'the" in front of the abbreviations but why not here? Sorry for not providing you with extended versions.

... user guide about IRS ... I'm sure this is done in print; in speaking, I would insert 'the'.

Specter, McKay and Iglesias appeared on NBC's "Meet the Press," ... This is fine.

Remember that for many things in any language we simply have no logical explanation. (I'm not saying there is no logical explanation for some of this, but I can't come up with one.)

Some questions

Anonymous — Wed, 28 Mar 2007 09:01:07 GMT

Please answer the following questions:

1. Why the word 'police' does not have a determiner in front of it when my dictionary noted that it could be a singular noun?

... identified by police and parents as the day-care center owner...

2. Is the following adjectival construction acceptable?

... 24 members of a University California, Irvine, rowing crew were ...

3. When you have abbrviations like IRS or NBC, don't you (usually??) put the article 'the" in front of the abbreviations but why not here? Sorry for not providing you with extended versions.

... user guide about IRS ...

Specter, McKay and Iglesias appeared on NBC's "Meet the Press," ...

Re: cheerleader

LearningNerd — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 17:49:17 GMT

The first one, because -- actually, I'm not quite sure how to explain it. Well, a quick search on google for "thing after thing was" has about 100 results, while "thing after thing were" has none.

Hmm. As I understand it, the only way to form a plural subject out of two singular nouns is to join them with the word "and". Other joining words like "or" require a singular verb, and I guess "after" does, too. There's probably a word for this sort of "one after another" construction -- does anyone know?

Re: unisex 'they'

Mister Micawber — Mon, 28 Aug 2006 10:39:05 GMT

You might want to read this, for instance, from the American Heritage Book of English Usage:

The alternative to the masculine generic with the longest and most distinguished history in English is the third-person plural pronoun. Recognized writers have used they, them, themselves, and their to refer to singular nouns such as one, a person, an individual, and each since the 1300s. For example, in 1759 the Earl of Chesterfield wrote, âIf a person is born of aâ¦gloomy temperâ¦they cannot help it,â and, echoing this sentiment, W. M. Thackeray wrote in Vanity Fair in 1848, âA person canât help their birth.â	1
Modern writers of note, from George Bernard Shaw to Anne Morrow Lindbergh, have also used this construction, in sentences such as To do a person in means to kill them and When you love someone you do not love them all the time. The practice is widespread and can be found in such mainstream publications as Christian Science Monitor, The Washington Post, Discover, and Wall Street Journal.	2
The use of the plural pronoun to refer to a singular noun or pronoun is hardly restricted to writing, however. Its use is so common in speech as to go without being noticed. And it is a favorite among advertisers, as in the slogan In matters of taste, to each their own.	3
When people shy away from using they to refer to a singular antecedent, it is usually out of respect for the traditional grammatical rule concerning pronoun agreement. Most of the Usage Panel rejects the use of they with singular antecedents as ungrammatical, even in informal speech. Eighty-two percent find the sentence The typical student in the program takes about six years to complete their course work unacceptable. Interestingly enough, panel members seem to make a distinction between singular nouns, such as the typical student and a person, and pronouns that are grammatically singular but semantically plural, such as anyone, everyone, and no one. Sixty-four percent of panel members accept the sentence No one is willing to work for those wages anymore, are they? in informal speech. Many writers might now consider this too fine a distinctionârejecting they for singular nouns but allowing it for singular pronouns that are plural in meaningâperhaps because they feel it will be missed by readers, who might merely think that the writer is being inconsistent.

Re: can you tell me my mistake please?

Crux_online — Wed, 23 Nov 2005 15:45:36 GMT

There are many mistakes here, mostly of usage. I will address the major problems here.

First sentence: a teen have benn victim of a short missed ,then he tried to kill his agressor,he had a feud with the two boys.

Let's correct the spelling first:

A teen have been victim of a shot missed, then he tried to kill his aggressor, he had a feud with the two boys.

Here, have been does not agrees with the subject. In order to agree with the 3rd person singular noun teen, have been must become has been.

A teen has been victim of a shot missed, then he tried to kill his aggressor, he had a feud with the two boys.

Now let's look at the tone of the sentence. When you use a construction like has been, you are usually talking about some past event--you really are not concerned with the event itself, just that it has happened. Here, however, you are describing a specific event. You will want to point to that past event with a verb in the simple past (we'll add the proper article, a, for good measure:

A teen was a victim of a shot missed, then he tried to kill his aggressor, he had a feud with the two boys.

Now you have a complete sentence up to the underlined portion. The underlined portion should be a separate sentence because it is a separat thought and includes its own subject and predicate:

A teen was a victim of a shot [that] missed, then he tried to kill his aggressor, He had a feud with the two boys.

These sentences are now complete and correct.

Here is the rest with the errors underlined:

For the principal who try to make her life bettter , the solution isn't it police but more discussion, help and hope.she says that apathy and rage are the enemies of children not knives an guns

And corrected for spelling, verb tense and agreement, and usage:

For the principal who (tries / is trying) to make her life better, the solution isn't [more] police, but more discussion, help, and hope. She says that apathy and rage are the enemies of children, not knives and guns.

To may want to look at your other compositions in the same way. Don't look at the work as a whole, but separate the parts of the task of correction and perform each task separately (correct the spelling, then correct verb tense, etc.)

C