Linked Questions
10 questions linked to/from In special cases, can you use "one such family are" vs. "one such family is"?
100
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13
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Are collective nouns (and in particular companies) always given a plural verb form, or are certain ones treated as singular?
I'd say Microsoft have a way of bending the rules and I know that McLaren have won the championship. While this sounds strange, I believe it is correct English (sorry, I'm not native).
But when it's ...
- 1,895
22
votes
2
answers
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Agreement in "[Singular Noun] Is/Are [Plural Noun]"?
My fish's native habitat is rice fields.
My fish's native habitat are rice fields.
Which one is correct? I'm pretty sure it's the first, since 'is' modifies 'habitat,' but it still sounds weird...
- 697
1
vote
0
answers
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Having a singular subject and a plural object - which form to choose for the verb? [duplicate]
Possible Duplicates:
In special cases, can you use “one such family are” vs. “one such family is”?
[Singular] Is/Are [Plural]?
I often encounter sentences like
The ...
- 273
9
votes
10
answers
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Which is correct: The rest of the staff is or are? The rest of my family is or are?
I hope you can enlighten me. I get varying answers in Google and I need to find out which is the correct grammatical structure for these sentences.
The rest of the staff is/are on leave at the ...
- 91
5
votes
4
answers
17k
views
A pack of wolves run through the woods [duplicate]
Is the correct to say
A pack of wolves run through the woods
or is the correct English
A pack of wolves runs through the woods
The former sounds right. However, I think the subject is a pack ...
- 217
6
votes
2
answers
15k
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"Her whole family IS/ARE biologists"? [duplicate]
I'm not sure whether to put is (number agreeing with the singular her whole family) or are (number agreeing with plural biologists) in this sentence:
Her whole family is/are biologists.
After some ...
- 195
13
votes
1
answer
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How do I determine subject and subject complement in "A side-effect is the spread of commercialese to other domains."?
Consider this example:
Commercialese is an instrument of art,
designed to enrich and invigorate our
language—surely you will all agree
with this—, and we should encourage newcomers to learn ...
-2
votes
2
answers
2k
views
Which sentence is correct and why (is VS are) [duplicate]
"The only thing holding me back is the available colours."
or
"The only thing holding me back are the available colours."
It seems to me like a glitch either way. I slightly favour the second one ...
2
votes
1
answer
778
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Is this mixture of plural and singular legitimate?
But what is most important for our purposes is that these changes were
the signal for the resumption of historical debate on a grand scale,
of the kind that had been suspended or driven ...
- 1,547
1
vote
1
answer
272
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"was" or "were" when there is number mismatch between subject and predicative complement [duplicate]
I have a question about this sentence:
The only thing he feared more than the wolves were the swirling buzzards.
I believe it to be correct, but someone suggested that the "were" should be changed ...
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