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Agreement and Reference Errors
Subject-Verb Agreement
The general rule is that the subject and verb must agree in number. If the
subject is singular or noncountable, the verb is singular. If the subject is
plural, the verb is plural. Following are several situations in which errors in
agreement often occur. 1. When a modifying phrase or clause separates the subject
from the verb, all the words within the phrase or clause should be ignored
when determining whether the verb is singular or plural (except in the
situation described in A2, below).
The man {with five cats} has to buy lots of cat food.
The men {who are fishing through the ice} are cold. 2. When the subject of a clause is
All of the children are happy.
None of the cooked cabbage was eaten.
Some of the butter has crumbs in it.
3. A compound indefinite such as everyone, nothing, or something is considered a singular and is followed by a singular verb.
No one was happy that the meeting lasted longer than expected.
Anyone who wanted to was able to attend the festival.
4. A gerund, an infinitive, or a noun clause used as a noun-substitute is normally treated like a noncountable and, therefore, is followed by a singular verb.
Jogging is a popular sport in the United States.
To err is human.
That the election will be lost is uncertain.
5. Compound subjects connected by and are followed by a plural verb, while compound subjects connected by or or nor agree in number with the subject nearest the verb. If this subject is singular or noncountable, the verb is singular. If the subject is plural, then the verb is plural.
Mary and her cousin often enjoy swimming at Hillcrest Park.
Either Bill's parents or his older sister is going to bring the hotdogs to the picnic.
Neither Sam nor his roommates plan to hold a party on Halloween.
6. When the verb comes before the subject, as in some questions, in statements beginning with the expletive there, or in some sentences with an introductory place expression, the verb must agree with the subject, despite the subject being out of its normal position. If two or more subjects are connected by or or nor, as in the second and third examples below, the verb agrees with the nearest of the subjects, even though the change in the position of the verb may make subject-verb agreement different from that in the corresponding statement. (See C5 above.)
the speakers late for the conference?Were
Is either Bill or his roommates happy about the increase in rent? (vs. Neither Bill nor his roommates are happy about the increase in rent.)
Are either the boys or their sister going to visit their aunt this summer? (vs. Either the boys or their sister is going to visit their aunt this summer.)
There is some ice in the refrigerator.
There are some rotten apples under the apple tree.
In the corner of the garden underneath a huge apple tree were two small squirrels and a rabbit.
7. When a clause marker is the subject of a dependent clause, the verb in the clause agrees in number with the antecedent of the clause marker (that is, with the word the clause marker refers to).
The planes which are going to be built by the Boeing Company will cost billions of dollars.
The man who is on Bill's right used to play the trumpet in the St. Paul symphony orchestra.
A pronoun must agree in both number and gender with the word it refers to (that is, with its antecedent).
Incorrect: Mrs. Smith is unhappy about the way his hair looks and plans to complain to his hairdresser about it.
Correct: Mrs. Smith is unhappy about the way her hair looks and plans to complain to her hairdresser about it.
Correct: Mrs. Smith is unhappy about the way her son's hair looks and plans to complain to his hairdresser about it.
Incorrect: Of the hundreds of people hearing about the plane crash, not one called to offer their help.
Correct: Of the hundreds of people hearing about the plane crash, not one called to offer his or her help.
Incorrect: Everyone that I telephoned said that they were busy.
Correct: Everyone that I telephoned said that he or she was busy.
Currently many persons object to the traditional use of forms of the masculine pronoun "he" to refer back to singulars indicating a combination of males and females because they feel the practice is sexist. As a result, they employ
"he or she" or "he/she" and similar forms in situations like those in the final two examples above, a solution that many consider awkward and wordy. Often a better solution is to rephrase the sentence so that the problem of whether to follow the older or the more recent custom is avoided. Following are alternative ways of correcting the agreement errors in the last two examples above:Correct: Of the hundreds of people hearing about the plane crash, not one called to offer help.
Correct: Everyone that I telephoned claimed to be busy.
At other times shifting to either a passive construction or a plural is an acceptable solution to the problem:
Undesirable: When a driver doesn't wear his or her seat belt, he or she is often more severely injured in a traffic accident than he or she would have been if he or she had worn his or her seat belt.
Better: When seat belts aren't worn, more severe injuries often result from a traffic accident than there would have been if seat belts had been worn. (passive)
Even better: When drivers don't wear seat belts, they are often more severely injured in a traffic accident than they would have been if they had worn them. (plural)
In English, adjectives and nouns modifying other nouns do not agree in number with the words they modify. The simple form is customarily employed.
Bill owns two old cars. (adjective modifier)
Fields in which beans are grown are called bean fields. (noun used as modifier)
Exception: Modifiers derived from proper nouns that are normally plural and from a few other nouns where a shift to a second definition would take place if the form were singular use the plural form:
a United Nations observer, Materials Testing Laboratory, the Periodicals Room in a library.
Technically, pronouns should refer to one specific word or group of words, never to an entire sentence or an entire concept. If there is no such word or group of words (that is, if a pronoun has no antecedent), then a reference error exists. A reference error also occurs when it is unclear which of two or more words in the context is the intended antecedent. Following are examples of three of the most common types of reference errors and of some ways to correct them:
Incorrect: Bill's vacation was delayed by the merger of his company with another, which he had expected.
Correct: As he had expected, Bill's vacation was delayed when his company merged with another. (Bill expected the delay in his vacation.)
Correct: Bill's vacation was delayed when the expected merger of his company with another took place. (Bill expected the merger.)
Incorrect: Mary received a letter of admission from Harvard University, which was a great honor.
Correct: Mary's admission to Harvard University was a great honor.
Although the indefinite this is frequently found in conversation and in writing imitating speech, it is best to be more precise in other types of writing, especially in academic writing, since readers have no means of asking for clarification if they are unsure about what is intended.
Undesirable: The candidate failed to respond adequately to the charge that he was soft on crime. This was what the opposition had hoped for.
Better: The candidate failed to respond adequately to the charge that he was soft on crime. This failure was what the opposition had hoped for.
Better: The candidate's failure to respond adequately to the charge that he was soft on crime was what the opposition had hoped for.
Undesirable: George didn't file his petition of candidacy for mayor before the deadline. This means that his opponent will automatically win the election.
Better: George's not filing his petition of candidacy for mayor on time means that his opponent will automatically win the election.
Better: Because George didn't file his petition of candidacy for mayor on time, his opponent will automatically win the election.
As the following example shows, it is sometimes impossible to be sure who the person a pronoun refers to is when two persons of the same gender are included in the same context.
Incorrect: Mary's sister said that she would soon leave on her trip to Japan.
Correct: Mary's sister said that Mary would soon leave on her trip to Japan.
Correct: Mary's sister said, "I will soon leave on my trip to Japan."