Re: job-hunt weirdness (Gene Kim-Eng)

[Janet Swisher <jmswisher -at- gmail -dot- com>]

On 7/10/09, Handy, David <dhandy -at- informatica -dot- com> wrote:
> Sorry but I really feel the need to stomp on this -
>  In what universe is "twenty years has taught me" correct?

I don't know about you, but I live in a universe where it is
acceptable to most native English speakers for a subject and verb to
agree based on meaning, rather than on overt grammatical markers. Only
those who overthink about grammatical consistency see any problems
with this. "Twenty years" is taken as a unit in this case, and
therefore can have a singular verb. This is called "notional
agreement". I recommend "Merriam Webster's Concise Dictionary of
English Usage" (2002) for its discussion of this topic and many
others.

Some other examples, quoted in MWCDEU from Quirk et al., "A
Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language", 1985:

* Ten dollars is all I have left
* Two miles is as far as they can walk.
* Two thirds of the area is under water.

To my ear, the first two would sound stilted with plural verbs, and
the third would sound absurd.

> In that
>  universe, the following are also correct:
>  "Mine eyes has seen the glory... "
>  "Many hands makes light work."

No, in these cases, the plurally-marked subjects are not considered
unitary in meaning.

>  If one said "twenty years' experience has taught me" then ok, one would
>  have a plausible case. But that wasn't what was said.
>
>  Feel free to stomp back if I've missed something -

I stopped reading the thread a good while ago, but then it showed up
again under a new subject heading with your invitation.

>
>  -----Original Message-----
>  From: techwr-l-bounces+dhandy=informatica -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
>  [mailto:techwr-l-bounces+dhandy=informatica -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com] On
>  Behalf Of Janet Littell
>  Sent: 09 July 2009 17:23
>  To: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
>  Subject: Re: job-hunt weirdness (Gene Kim-Eng)
>
>  I wonder if Michael's original remark was based on both meanings below.
>  If so, either "has" or "have" could do the job.
>  Janet
>
>
>  > From: "Gene Kim-Eng" <techwr -at- genek -dot- com>
>  > Subject: Re: job-hunt weirdness
>  >
>  > My impression of this "tedious argument" is that Michael is not the
>  > one who started it.
>  >
>  > Collective nouns are one of the major hair-pullers of the English
>  > language.
>  > They may be either singular or plural, depending on what message the
>  > user intends to deliver.  My interpretation of Michael's "years have"
>  > was that he had learned a lesson from repeated observations of other
>  > peoples' poor use of grammar over a period of years, while your
>  > preferred "years has"
>  > would have
>  > suggested to me that he had spent those years continuously studying
>  > the subject before coming to his conclusion.  Perhaps Michael can tell
>
>  > us which he intended.
>  >
>  > For my part, I would rather spend an evening listening to Norm Crosby
>  > recordings than try to correct someone else's usage of a collective
>  > noun without a stack of academic references in my hand.

That's why I love MWCDEU. It covers all the issues raised by two and a
half centuries of English usage books, and provides guidance based on
evidence of contemporary usage. The editors' descriptivist stance
prevents them from being snarky about usage, so instead they are
snarky about past usage writers.

-- 
Visit my blog at: http://www.janetswisher.com
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