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Which do you think is more appropriate, "Meeting call to order" or "Meeting called to order" if it's used in a printed meeting program?

As for now, the program looks like this:

  • 13:45 [Doors open]
  • 14:00 [Meeting called to order] [Opening Remarks & Welcome Guests]
  • 14:05 [Business session]
  • 14:10 [1st speaker] ... and so on.

A native English speaker from England says "Meeting called to order" is more appropriate, whereas some supervisor pointed out that it should be "Meeting call to order."

To me, it looks a little confusing when "called" (past particle) and "to order" (infinitive) are used together. It's because past particle can be used for both 'passive' and also 'perfect' tense, while infinitive can imply 'future tense' for something that is yet to be taken place. Thus, I find "Meeting call to order" visually less troublesome, as "Meeting call" shows up as a noun phrase.

So, my question is,

  1. Which is more idiomatic and frequently used?
  2. Are both grammatically accepted? And if not, which one is correct and why?

If you could provide me with some explanation, I would greatly appreciate it!

Thanks!

1 Answer 1

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called is more idiomatic and frequently used. There's an implied is or will be, it's short for a sentence like:

At 14:00 the meeting will be called to order.

Your preference suggests that you consider call to order to be a noun phrase, suggesting that it's short for:

At 14:00 the meeting's call to order will take place.

I don't think this is the usual interpretation.

I'm not sure that "grammatical" is something we typically apply to abbreviated constructs like programs.

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  • Thanks, Mr. Barmar. Your explanation was persuasive! I would like to wait for other answers.
    – Motoko M
    Commented Feb 25, 2014 at 21:43

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