punctuation - I'm looking for the possessive of 'boss'

What is the possessive of boss; ie, how do you describe the son of the boss?

grammaticality - "There's too many numbers" vs "There are too many numbers"

When people use plural nouns after the word "there's", for example:

There's too many numbers.

it makes me a bit frustrated. I try to correct it by using "There are," but it still happens sometimes to me (the "there's" situation). Do you think that there are is the correct usage option? People usually use there's, as I said.

Answer

If you want always to write, "There are too many damn fools on the Internet", then no one is stopping you. FWIW you have my blessing. But if you want to mount a crusade against what Marius calls the informal & casual "There's too many damn fools", then I think you have a job for life.

prepositions - Necessity of "in" and "the"?

Please let me know which sentence is correct. I have faced the first and third one in the Longman dictionary, but dictionaries are prone to typos and errors. So I couldn't be sure which one is correct and which one is not. Please help me know.

1. The verb is in the past tense.


2. The verb is in past tense.


3. The verb is past tense.

past perfect - "Get used" vs "got used"

I'm learning English grammar with the book by Raymond Murphy: English Grammar in Use [3rd Edition]. In the exercises for unit 61, I have to complete the sentences using used to. I can't understand why I have to say get used to living instead of got used to living for this example:

Sue moved from a big house to a much smaller one. She found it strange at first. She had to __________ in a much smaller house.

Is it past simple or past perfect?

Answer

I can see why this would be confusing.

• She would have to get used to living in a smaller house.


• She had to get used to living in a smaller house.


• She had gotten used to living in a smaller house.


• She got used to living in a smaller house.

All of these are acceptable. Each has a slightly different time reference; the first one is looking ahead, and the last two are looking back.

As Brett indicated, the problem with the one in the book (had to got used to) is you don't use "got" after "to".

Should I use present tense in reporting speech?

Should I use present tense in reported speech? I have both sentences and not sure which one is correct:

• (1) Peter mentioned that the formula A is based on formula B.


• (2) Peter mentioned that the formula A was based on formula B.

Should I use present tense here as it is a fact (always)? However, it also makes sense by using past tense in reporting speech. Also, can the "that" be omitted?

Thanks!

Answer

1. Use the present if what Peter was trying to convey is about something being true in general or persistently (regardless of whether that something is in fact true in general...).

   
   
   

   This example is clearer, I think: Peter said the sky is blue -- vs -- Peter said the western sky was a particularly bright orange when the sun hit the horizon that evening.




2. Yes, you can remove that "that". But the sentence can be easier to understand, esp. by some non-native English speakers, if you leave it in. And esp. since you do not use "the formula B" here, you can say "... that formula A is based on formula B."

Take time and tense out of the question, to see what it means to make a general (and atemporal) statement (which one can make at any point in time). And no, quotation need not be involved either.

• Water is a colorless, transparent liquid. [general statement about the nature of water]



• The water in my glass is cloudy and brown. [specific statement about this water]




• Peter explained that water is a colorless, transparent liquid.



• Peter told the waiter that the water in his glass was cloudy and brown.

It is correct to say either of these:

• Ptolemy claimed that the Earth is at the center of the [solar] system.


• Ptolemy claimed that the Earth was at the center of the [solar] system.

They both say that Ptolemy made a general statement. Neither is incorrect. The former emphasizes the generality of what was claimed (including its abstraction from time). The latter emphasizes the claim as historical claim: the time-limited nature of its meaning.

IOW, it all depends on what you are really trying to say. This is about logic and meaning as much as it is about language (wording).

And FWIW, I agree 100% with this post about the same topic. Both can be correct, and there can be a slightly different connotation (emphasis) if you use one or the other. Neither is "awful".

grammar - Employees vs Staff

It feels more correct to say "This food was cooked by the staff of Eat Out restaurant" as opposed to "This food was cooked by the employees of Eat Out restaurant."

I cannot, however explain to an English learner why this is so. Is it just a matter of common usage? Is there a grammatical angle to it?

Answer

This is an example of the very common phenomenon in English (and many other languages for that matter) of having two similar words coming from different origins. Staff is a Germanic word that comes from middle English while employee came into English from French in the 1800s.

In general they can be used interchangeably, but they do have different subtleties. Employee is a bit more formal and it emphasizes that the person doing the work is getting paid. In contrast, staff is a bit more general and simply implies that a person is a member of a group carrying out work.

In your example, both sentences work just fine. The second may seem a bit unnatural because employee is emphasizing that the workers are getting paid, but this is irrelevant in the context of your sentence (just a theory). For somebody learning English as a second language, both should be acceptable in my opinion.

the term for a noun that is the act of doing a verb

What is it called when you have a noun that is either the act of doing a verb or the result of having done the verb, and is not a gerund, and usually has a suffix like "al" or "tion"?

Examples:

• remove -> removal


• add -> addition

And by extension, my actual problem is to find this form for the word "edit." Something that is not a gerund and means the equivalent of the pseudo-word "editation".

Answer

I don’t believe there is a single, unambiguous word for this precise concept.

The class of deverbal nouns comes very close:

Deverbal nouns are nouns that are derived from verbs or verb phrases, but that behave grammatically purely as nouns, not as verbs. They are distinct from verbal noun types such as gerunds and infinitives, which behave like verbs within their phrase (although that verb phrase is then used as a noun phrase within the larger sentence).

But as you can see, a deverbal noun does not necessarily mean either the act of doing the noun or the result of it. They nearly always do, but they may have other meanings as well (e.g., from exist we have the deverbal noun existence, which is neither the act nor the result of existing, but more like the state in which existing occurs).

Deverbal nouns are by some considered a subcategory of verbal nouns. The Wikipedia article treats them as such, by which definition the best answer to your question is probably verbal noun.

Unfortunately not everyone would agree with that definition. In my experience, the more common definition of a verbal noun in the context of English is any noun form that corresponds to a verb, refers to the action (or result) or a verb and retains some verbal traits, like the ability to take objects for example. In English, that means infinitives (‘to err is human’) and gerunds (‘dreaming is easy’), but not deverbal nouns, which are pure nouns and do not retain any verbal properties. I would classify both the examples you give as deverbal nouns, but not verbal nouns; others would classify them as both.

There is also the question of whether you actually want to include forms like infinitives and gerunds – the examples you give are both derived nouns, whereas infinitives and gerunds are inflected forms; and since you say you’re really looking for a word of this type for edit that isn’t a gerund, I’m guessing you want to exclude the inflected forms.

So depending on your theoretical standpoint and whether you want to refer to both inflected and derived forms, I think your best choice would be either verbal noun, deverbal noun, or both. Since you appear to not want to include gerunds, I will suggest deverbal noun as your best bet, even though a deverbal noun doesn’t necessarily have to refer to the act or result of the base verb.

grammaticality - "Heard me [infinitive]" vs. "heard me [present participle]"

"Heard me [infinitive]" vs. "heard me [present participle]"

• 
  
  1. At that time, you wouldn't have heard me talk about it.
  
  
  2. At that time, you wouldn't have heard me talking about it.
  
  


• 
  
  1. At that time, you wouldn't have heard me condemn it.
  
  
  
  2. At that time, you wouldn't have heard me condemning it.
  
  

Which one of the above sentences are incorrect and why?

Answer

None of them are incorrect.

English sense verbs, unlike most complement-taking verbs,
can take either gerund or infinitive complements.

• I saw/heard him leave/leaving.

This is most common with long-distance senses, of course;
-- She smelled him leaving is a fairly unlikely (though not ungrammatical) thing to say.

It may be (and undoubtedly some people interpret it this way, though others don't)
that

• I heard him leaving.

means something like (and may be a variant of)

• I heard him while he was (in the act of) leaving.

while

• I heard him leave.

means something like

• I heard the noise produced by his leaving.

Not a whole lot of difference here, and for all intensive purposes they're synonymous.

Ending a clause with a preposition, rule of thumb or hard rule?

So we've all heard the admonishments from our teachers not to end a clause with a preposition

A plumber visits a wealthy estate to fix a clogged toilet. As the butler opens the door, the plumber barks out,"I'm here to fix the toilet. Where's your bathroom at?"

"Please try to speak with more discretion. We do not want to disturb our neighbors with the details of our plumbing issues. And we most certainly do not end our sentences with prepositions, sir.

So the plumber lowers his tone and says more cordially, "I'm here to fix the toilet. Where's your bathroom at, asshole."

Anyway, back to the matter at hand. I have come under the impression that this is a rule of thumb to help the elementary student avoid mismatching case for the target of the preposition rather than a hard rule. For example by placing the preposition closer to its target, you avoid constructs like: "Who did you give the invitation to?" instead of the proper "To whom did you give the invitation?". Moving the preposition closer makes the incorrect case sound absurd. No one would ever say "To who did you give the invitation?"

All of this introductory text leads up to this simple question: Is this phrase correct "Whom did you give the invitation to?" or is it still incorrect english even though we addressed the issue of case?

Answer

I would say it's a rule of thumb, to avoid students make errors.

The NOAD, in the note about the usage of who versus whom reports that

The normal practice in modern English is to use who instead of whom and, where applicable, to put the preposition at the end of the sentence.
- Who do you think we should support?
- Who do you wish to speak to?

It also reports that

Such uses are today broadly accepted in standard English, but in formal writing it is best to maintain the distinction.

As you are using whom, the correct sentence is

To whom did you give the invitation?

possessives - Yours vs. your's

Which is correct “Is that yours?” or “Is that your’s?”?

I ask because it is possessive, so I would think it would be the latter, but I typically use and see the former usage.

Are there particular cases in which one should be used instead of the other? Or is one simply correct and the other not?

This is one of the few things that still confuse me, so help is greatly appreciated.

Answer

It would definitely, unequivocally, and undeniably be yours. Same with ours. No apostrophe needed, and if you put one in, dark things may happen.

From NOAD:

yours |yôrz; yoŏrz|
possessive pronoun

1 used to refer to a thing or things belonging to or associated with the person or people that the speaker is addressing : the choice is yours | it's no business of yours.

grammar - Is it correct to use "his" in this prepositional phrase?

In this chat message I was attempting to say that I was installing Ubuntu on a friends laptop. What I wrote was,

I had a friend for whom I installed Ubuntu on his laptop.

Grammatically, it seems like it works: if I switch around the sentence a bit, I would still use the same kind of prepositional phrase:

I installed Ubuntu on a friend's laptop for him.

Also, if I simply replace the his for an a, it sounds right:

I had a friend for whom I installed Ubuntu on a laptop.

However, how I initially wrote it, it doesn't sound right. Is what I wrote initially correct, and if not, why not?

Answer

All of the examples given are correct, though they differ slightly in meaning.

In the first two, the use of "his" indicates that the laptop belongs to the friend (and that the friend is male).

In the last example, the use of "a" just indicates that you did your friend a favor by installing Ubuntu on a laptop. It does not specify whether the laptop belongs to the friend or not, nor does it imply the gender of the friend.

grammar - omit "to" after helping someone

So lucky to have friends helping you get the job.

So lucky to have friends helping you "to" get the job.

Which one is correct?
Is it fine that omit the to in the second sentence?

personal pronouns - What do you say when you don't know someone's gender?

For example, I want to refer to someone on the internet, but I don't know this person's gender. Which personal-pronoun do I use? (as article I mean he, she, it, etc)

Answer

It's perfectly fine to use they in the singular sense. (Verbs are conjugated the same as they would be in the plural sense: "are they joking?", "did they break anything?".)

All the same, when the gender is not known, some authors prefer constructions like (s)he, he/she, he or she, she or he, etc., some prefer to stick with the masculine pronoun as default (he), others prefer to stick with the feminine pronoun for balance (she), some will alternate using he and she in their writing.

prepositions - "... that ... with ..." and "... which ... with ..."

1. The fact that I communicated to Mona is irrelevant.


2. The fact that I communicated with Mona is irrelevant.

The only difference might seem to be the different prepositions, with and to.

Now, try replacing the that in each sentence by which. Do you agree that you can do it with 1) but not 2)? If so, what exactly is wrong with "The fact which I communicated with Mona is irrelevant"?

Answer

The short answer: that can be a conjunction or a relative pronoun; only when it is a relative pronoun can it be replaced with which.

Your first example could mean either of the following:

a.) This fact, which I communicated to Mona, is irrelevant — relative pronoun.

b.) The fact that I communicated something to Mona is irrelevant — conjunction.

If we read it as a), the word that in your example has a function within the predicate of the subordinate clause that I communicated to Mona: it is the object of communicated. What did I communicate? I communicated the fact ( = the antecedent of that).

If we read it as b), that just serves to introduce the content of the subordinate clause, but it does not itself have a function within the predicate of the clause: that's why it is called a conjunction.

In your second example, however, the preposition with makes it unlikely that an object is present: you would normally not say, ?I communicated this with Mona. For that reason, we automatically read that as a conjunction here, not a relative pronoun; and only relative pronouns can be replaced with which.

Auxiliary DO in "I do love you"

I am wondering about the meaning and use of DO in "I do love you". Is it just an emphatic use that means "I really love you! I love you so!" or a contraditory statement:

• You don't love me!


• You're wrong, I do love you!

capitalization - Should foreign titles be capitalized according to English rules?

Most words in a title are capitalized in English but this is not true of all languages; others only capitalize the first word and proper nouns. When you want to use a foreign title in an English text, say Lorem ipsum, which is the correct capitalization?

Option 1: Use English rules.

Lorem Ipsum is a pretty interesting book.

Option 2: Use rules of the original language.

Lorem ipsum is a pretty interesting book.

Capitalization of words with dashes in titles

How would you capitalize a word in a book/article title when that word has an en dash in the middle of it? For instance, should "protein-protein interaction" be capitalized as "Protein-protein Interaction" or "Protein-Protein Interaction"?

Answer

Capitalize each word that is a word on its own, as in "Protein–Protein Interaction". If the hyphen adds a prefix that doesn't stand on its own, like "Non-protein Elements", then capitalize the prefix. But I've seen it both ways.

expressions - "Social media post" or "social-media post"?

Should "social media" be spelled with a hyphen in the phrase "social media post"?

To me, the hyphen looks wrong, but I would like to be able to provide some grammatical rationale to explain why.

questions - "Who are the neighbors of who?" : is this grammatically correct?

Temporary reopen note:

This question may appear at first blush to be about whether to use who or whom. However, the naturalness and grammaticality of this phrase has to do with the periphrastic genitive versus the saxon genitive, not whether to use nominative or accusative case. For this reason this is both a useful question and not a duplicate of the linked-to post here:

---

The Question:

Just to give a few details: I am writing an answer to an exercise, the exercise describes arranged objects, I want to state that the provide information allows one to deduce what are the neighboring objects.

How do I say it in one sentence - "who are the neighbors of who?" It does not sound correct to me...

I would appreciate if someone could point out if this is correct and would be grateful if there is a way to break this down or compare with similar language construction to help get familiar with this type of sentences.

pronouns - How to tell if "which" refers to subject or object of main clause?

I have not been able to find a satisfactory answer regarding rules about this issue. What I have heard are lots of opinions:

Here is a picture of my house, which I like very much.

Here is a picture of my house that I like very much.

In the second example, that clearly refers to the subject of the main clause, since we could omit it and it would still mean the same thing:

Here is a picture of my house I like very much.

In the first example, is there any rule about what which refers to? There is some ambiguity otherwise.

Answer

There's ambiguity when you try to analyze a sentence devoid of any communicative context. But since language is "quite often" used for communication, other things serve to help disambiguate; such as perceived speaker's intention, the topic of the discourse, the intended function of the sentence. If they don't, you can always ask your interlocutor whether he is referring to the picture or to the house.

usage - Shakespeare Use of present tense narrating a past action

in Macbeth, Acte III -scene 6,

In this portion of the scene:
« 
Lennox- Sent he to Macduff?

Lord - He did, and with an absolute 'Sir, not I,'
The cloudy messenger turns me his back,

And hums, as who should say 'You'll rue the time
That clogs me with this answer.' »

Why does Shakespeare use present tenses : « turns » and « hums » to narrate a past event ?

Thanks by advance,

Julien

adjectives - something full of/ a full something of

Can somebody explain the difference here and give some more appropriate examples on the construction? I sense there IS something, but I can't get to it individually.

1. a bowl full of mush




2. a full bowl of mush

word order - where to place *further* , *considering further*

As the closing sentence of a cover letter for an application I would like to write the sentence

I would appreciate your further considering my application and remain...

but is this correct, or should I rather place the word further differently?
The options are

1. I would appreciate your considering my application further and remain...


2. I would appreciate your considering further my application and remain...

Thank you in advance.

Answer

Since you said "ongoing", as an adjective, further could be used in the sense 'additional.'

The meeting ended without any plans for further discussions.

       I would appreciate your considering my application further.... 

In the same vein, you could use further in your sentence, however, in my opinion a better construction will be:

I would appreciate your further consideration of my application
or

As @Joe states, 'I appreciate your consideration of my application
Further discussion

grammatical number - Among his greatest hits (were?/was?) the anthem. Which verb is correct?

I read this article and found a sentence that says:

Among his greatest hits were the anthem "Bring Him Back Home," demanding Nelson Mandela's freedom from jail.

Could you explain why the sentence used 'were' as the verb? I think the subject and the object are inverted in this sentence. Therefore, it can say that

The anthem "Bring Him Back Home," demanding Nelson Mandela's freedom from jail was among his greatest hits.

So the subject is the anthem "Bring him back home" and I thought its verb should be 'was' because the anthem is in the singular.

I would appreciate a little bit of help.

differences - The Use of the Present Perfect. What is natural?

Sometimes, I got really confused by the use of the Present Perfect tense. Given the fact, that we don't have this structure in Russian, all we can is to base our knowledge on grammar rules.

The rules are quite simple:

1. Experience: I have been to London twice.




2. Unfinished actions: I have lived in Moscow since I was born.




3. Close connection to the present situation: I have just cooked dinner.

However, when it comes to simple questions, all that grammar rules are not so obvious. For example, if I am not sure and want to re-ask, could I say something like

Have you meant? or Did you mean?

Another case:

I've sent you the letter and I sent you the letter.

Does the first mean that I have just done it and the second that it was some time ago? How do you use it?

present perfect - Is "has died for several years" correct?

I know it is correct to say

He has been dead for three years.

I've learned the present perfect tense, and it's said that non-continuous verbs are allowed. Is this sentence correct as well?

He has died for three years.

Answer

Die is an Inchoative verb; that means it refers to a change of state.

The Present Perfect construction can be used with a Stative predicate like be dead or own a house the way you suggest. This is called the Universal sense of the Perfect.

But die is not stative; it's inchoative, and therefore punctual -- it refers only to the instant when the change took place. So, in principle, it could use the Existential sense of the Perfect, which is restricted to punctual, or at least completable, events.

He has died for three years.

which suggests that he has died several times over a time span of three years. However, dying is something that can only be done once, and therefore a sentence like this is apt to raise an eyebrow, at least.

Hint: in situations like this, remember that Stative - Inchoative - Causative predicates come in triples, and there's usually one with the right characteristics available for use in a different construction. In this case, the triple is kill - die - dead (you need a be to carry the tense with dead, but it's a stative predicate, like most but not all adjectives).

That's why He's been dead for three years is what suggests itself to a native speaker.

present perfect vs simple past - I've just bought vs. I just bought vs. I bought

I bought an English grammar book 3 weeks ago. Is it correct to use any of the following sentences interchangeably to tell my friend that I bought the book, or is there a difference in meaning between each sentence?

1. I've just bought a book on English grammar, and it looks pretty good.


2. I just bought a book on English grammar, and it looks pretty good.


3. I bought a book on English grammar, and it looks pretty good.

The verb "to get" + particle ...?

In the phrase "to get all crazy" am I correct when I say that the "all crazy" is a particle phrase? Example:

I'm up for tonight's party. I'm going to get all crazy.

prepositions - "With who" vs. "with whom"

Is this correct?

The person with whom I'm doing the project should be here soon.

If it is, is with always a dative preposition (like mit in German)?

Answer

When "who" is the object of the preposition, as in this case, it becomes "whom"; granted, this is by now vestigial and often ignored in informal conversation. You'll often hear people say things like, "Who should I give this to?" It would be correct to say "Whom should I give this to?" and misguided fussbudgets will insist you render it as "To whom should I give this?" But almost no one bothers with that these days. Note that reversing the word order makes the incorrect grammar stand out: "I should give this to who?" That's because there is now a direct apposition with the preposition and its object. Most careful speakers will use "to whom" in that context.

You can remember when to use "who/whom" by substituting "he/him" in the sentence. You wouldn't say "I'm doing the project with he," you would say "I'm doing the project with him." So it's obvious that whom is the pronoun you would use here, not who.

A further word about German/English prepositions. In German some prepositions can be dative or accusative, depending on whether they indicate motion or placement towards or up to a location. This not the case (no pun intended) in English. In English, the object of the preposition always takes the "prepositional" case. Note that there are not nearly as many inflectional changes or pronoun substitutions in English as in German. The point is, German is not necessarily useful for analogizing English constructions.

grammar - Punctuation inside of quotation marks with technical phrases

If I am not mistaken, one should insert a period, question mark, etc. inside of the quotation mark in quoted speech. For example,

The man continued, "The sky is purple today."

My question concerns the use of punctuation when the thing within the quotation marks is a specific technical thing. For example,

The correct computer password is "AbCd!".

Should the period be before or after the final quotation mark in the last example?

Answer

A rule of thumb I follow is to include any punctuation that is in the material you are quoting (such as the exclamation mark in your second example), and let it end your sentence if it ends the sentence you are quoting. For instance, I think it would be fine not to put a period after the quotation mark in your second example.

On a slightly different note, if you are adding punctuation that does not appear in the material you are quoting, I would only put that punctuation inside of the quotation marks if it is a comma or a period. If you want to add any other punctuation (such as an exclamation or question mark) that does not appear in the material you quote, I would put it outside of the quotation mark to clarify that the emphasis is your own.

It is also worth noting that there seems to be a trend, especially among young people, toward leaving quoted material in its exact form, and putting all additional punctuation outside of the quotation marks. Personally, I think this makes a lot of sense and is in a way more honest. The primary reason that any additional punctuation is placed inside quotation marks is simply that many find it aesthetically nicer.

formality - Subjunctive mood: 'was' usage after 'I wish' and 'if only'

SFX Magazine had declared the sentence below as follow: 1) STAR TURN, 2) BEST LINES.

• 
  

  I wish Bernard Cribbins was my grandad. Perhaps he would be willing to
  adopt?

  
  




• 
  

  Rattigan: “If only that was possible.”
  The Doctor: “If only that were
  possible. Conditional clause.”

  
  
  

Is 'was' after 'I wish', 'if only' and 'if' (in conditional clauses) colloquial?

Does it be used in formal speech and writing?

Answer

There's nothing wrong with the sentences you write. Some people (I believe teachers among them) consider the use of the form was after I wish, if only and if (in conditional clauses) colloquial and claim that it shouldn't be used in formal speech and writing. They claim that the "correct" form to use is were. The language, however, has its own dynamics and is used regardless of the rules imposed.

grammar - Does English have any singularia tantum besides mass nouns?

Singularia tantum and pluralia tantum are, respectively, nouns that have only a singular form and nouns that have only a plural form.

In English, we have a handful of pluralia tantum that are mass nouns which take the plural form (e.g. "riches" and "remains"), a whole load of pluralia tantum that refer to things that come in pairs (e.g. "trousers", "sunglasses", "knickers", or "scissors"), and at least one plurale tantum that fits into neither of the above categories ("clothes", meaning multiple items of clothing - it's clear what the hypothetical singular "clothe" would mean, yet it mysteriously isn't a word). Singularia tantum, on the other hand, seem less varied. As far as I can tell, they are all mass nouns - things like "information", "milk", and "racism".

One can imagine there being a singulare tantum that is not a mass noun. For example, we can imagine an alternate universe in which it is still correct English to talk about "a dog", but talking about "dogs" in the plural is incorrect and funny in the same way that it is incorrect and funny to talk about a "scissor". It might seem unintuitive to think that such a noun even could exist - surely, if it is not a mass noun, then people would just pluralise it with an "s" on the end like most other words? But the converse argument could just as well be made about countable pluralia tantum, and I still cannot go to a shop and buy a "clothe". Hence my question: do we have any such countable singularia tantum in the language? Have we in the past?

Answer

What about a shambles? Although this used to be a plural form, today it's singular. See Oxford Dictionary Online. The first definition

1. informal [treated as singular] A state of total disorder,

is never pluralized in my experience. The second definition

2. [treated as singular] A butcher's slaughterhouse (archaic except in place names),

I can imagine pluralizing, but it's archaic.

possessives - How to make the genitive of a person's name with "OF"?

We built an engine for the boat of Mr. Sander

or

We built an engine for the boat of Mr Sander's

?

Answer

If you had to choose one of them, you should say "the boat of Mr. Sander's". But I don't think you should use either in contemporary English. I would say

a boat of Mr. Sander's,
this boat of Mr. Sander's,

but not

*the boat of Mr. Sander's.

As was noted in the comments, it is much better to use "Mr. Sander's boat."

Why is this? I suspect because "Mr. Sander's boat" already implies that Mr. Sanders owns only one boat, so this phrasing is shorter and simpler and means the same thing. If you want to replace "a boat of Mr. Sander's" using a possessive before the noun, you need to say "one of Mr. Sander's boats", which is longer than "a boat of Mr. Sander's"; both are fine in contemporary English.

If you use the indefinite article, it's clear (to me) that you should say "a boat of Mr. Sander's" and not *"a boat of Mr. Sander".

And if you use a different noun, you see that "a painting of Mr. Sander" and "a painting of Mr. Sander's" are both grammatical, but mean quite different things.

grammaticality - Should I say "there is a handful of..." or "there are a handful of...."?

I want to write that I have handful of somethings. Which of these is the correct form?

1. There is a handful of somethings.


2. There are a handful of somethings.

Are both correct?

Answer

Rimmer correctly identifies phrases like a handful of . . . and a pack of . . . as premodifying elements in a noun phrase, rather than as the subject of the clause and, for the same reason, Mustafa is right in saying that a number of . . . is followed by a plural verb. However, there is a tendency, particularly in speech, for There’s . . . rather than There are . . . to be used regardless of the number of the noun that follows, as in, for example, There’s a few people who believe my story. In the words of the ‘Longman Student Grammar of Spoken and Written English’ (the stripped-down version of the magisterial Longman Grammar),

‘in conversation . . . the verb is likely to be singular even when the
following notional subject is plural’.

And as ‘The Cambridge Guide to English Usage’ says,

[There’s] seems to be evolving into a fixed phrase, rather like the
French C’est . . . , serving the needs of the ongoing discourse rather than
the grammar of the sentence.

verbs - 3rd conditional plus 2nd conditional?

"If you had seen him as a child, you would agree that he is extraordinary."

In this sentence, changing the past perfect to simple past strikes me as wrong, and changing the "would agree" to "would have agreed" also strikes me as wrong. But what I'm left with is something that looks like a hybrid conditional. Basically, the first part of the sentence talks about then, and the second talks about now.

I would like to know whether this sentence is grammatical to begin with, and if it is, whether conditional sentences must always be expressed as on of the three types of conditionals.

etymology - Deontic “must”, “have to” and “had to”

In English, to express strong obligation we can use either must or have (got) to. Grammars remind us that must is often used to express internal (personal) obligation, deduction (likelihood), and exhortation.

1. The insulin shots for your pet must be given at twelve-hour intervals. (deontic)


2. We must be late, there's no one in the foyer. (epistemic)


3. If he wants to be healthier he must exercise. (deontic)

However, they tell us that have to tends to convey the rules and laws of an external authority which we have no choice but to follow and/or obey. The longer construction have got to is normally classified as being informal, and idiomatic in speech.

4. I'm sorry but we have to leave early. (deontic)


5. (a) You've got to believe me. (informal)
   (b) You gotta believe me. (very informal)

In my experience, this distinction between internal and external authority is very hazy and subjective, with the exception of sentence 2 where no obligation is expressed, native speakers use must and have (got) to more or less interchangeably.

In order to prove my point, consider how English expresses obligation in the past, the form had to is used whereas must is used with the perfect infinitive, i.e. must + have + past participle, to make speculations about the past and to convey certainty.

1. The insulin shots had to be given at twelve-hour intervals.


2. We must have been late, there was no one in the foyer


3. If he wanted to be healthier he had to exercise


4. We apologised and said we had to leave early.


5. You had to believe me.

In the sentences with had to, the distinction between internal and external obligation is completely lost, greater context is required to know who the person or entity of authority is. In other words, HAD TO functions as the past for both HAVE TO and MUST. If this distinction, which many grammar sites (see below) explain is relevant, why does it disappear in the past?

Questions

1. How and when did have to express the sense of obligation? What void did it fill?


2. If deductions (epistemic) in the past can be expressed with must + have + PP what happened to deontic must in the past? Is there an etymological explanation?


3. What happened to the distinction between internal (subjective) and external (objective) obligation when we speak about the past? Did it ever exist?

Sources:
Modals (1) Obligation
What's the difference between must and have to?
must / have to / have got to
Modals to express obligation: MUST, HAVE (GOT) TO
English modal verbs
Categorization principles of modal meaning categories

Answer

(1) How and when did have to express the sense of obligation? What void did it fill?

Have to is an example of what's called a Periphrastic Modal (periphrastic is a technical term for 'paraphrased', meaning taking more than one word). Most English modal auxiliary verbs have at least one matching periphrastic modal construction, viz:

• must ~ have to


• should ~ ought to


• can ~ (be) able to


• may ~ (be) possible


• will ~ (be) going to


• will ~ (be) willing to

These constructions are common and have been around a long time. They arose because, as mentioned in another answer, English modal auxiliaries are defective verbs and therefore can't be used in many places where they could make sense because their morphology forbids it.

Thus, while it's possible to speak of a past obligation, you can't use must in the past to do so

• *He musted go to the dentist yesterday.

but rather a periphrastic modal that does have a past tense

• He had to go to the dentist yesterday.

Similarly for infinitives and participles

• *I would hate to must rewrite my paper.


• I would hate to have to rewrite my paper.


• *He's musting rewrite his paper


• He's having to rewrite his paper


• *He has musted rewrite his paper



• He has had to rewrite his paper

And similarly for the other periphrastic modals (examples left as an exercise).

(2) If deductions (epistemic) in the past can be expressed with must + have + PP what happened to deontic must in the past? Is there an etymological explanation?

Oh, yes. It turns out that must is itself based on an old preterite form, and there simply is no present form, which would likely be something like *muss if it existed in English.

German still has inflected modals, and the 3s present tense form of the modal verb müssen is er muss 'he must', while the past tense form is er musste 'he had to'. The final -t in German is the past tense suffix, and the final -t in English must used to be a past tense morpheme, but now it's just part of the word.

(3) What happened to the distinction between internal (subjective) and external (objective) obligation when we speak about the past? Did it ever exist?

Nothing happened to it. It's a zombie rule. Some people believe that it is real and that they always mean things that way, whatever they may actually say. But in fact it is not anything like general, as you note, and it doesn't seem to describe many uses of must and have to, let alone other modal-paraphrase pairs.

Executive Summary: Don't believe everything you read. Especially not about English grammar.

conditionals - "was" as a past subjunctive

I'd like to know whether "was" should be treated as a subjunctive in the following:

a. If there were a 20-story office building without an elevator, those whose office was on the 18th floor would climb many steps each day.

b. If there were someone who was able to speak over 500 languages at native levels, he would be considered a genius of some sort.

Here was is used to describe hypothetical situations and is considered correct even in Standard American English

I'd appreciate your help

syntactic analysis - How can I rephrase compound sentences to make them simpler?

Following Martha's advise I am splitting up a question Compound sentences, the punctuation and mooore.

Consider the following sentence:

One of the items that needed a further development was a research on child nodes of a story representing its sub categories being updated the moment the list of sub categories is changed through edit page for stories.

While I indeed wanted to practice compound sentences (see a question Constructing compound sentences), another reason why this sentence is so complex is that I don't know how to split it into smaller parts.

Could you help me with it?

If you need the context please read a post from the second link.

Answer

I am not a native speaker, so there will sure be mistakes, but I would write:

One of the items that needed more work was research on story child nodes updating. The child nodes represent story sub categories and should be automatically updated when the list of sub categories is changed on the story edit page.

adjectives - "A place nearby" but not "A place good"

I can ask any of:

Do you know a breakfast place nearby?
Do you know a nearby breakfast place?
Do you know a good breakfast place?

but I really can't ask:

Do you know a breakfast place good?

Is there a general rule for determining whether an adjective must come before the noun or may come, Spanish-style, after it?

Answer

The general rule is

One-word modifiers precede the noun; modifiers of more than one word follow the noun.

I call this the Eleven-year-old boy rule.

If you make a single word out of a phrase, it can precede (that's what the hyphens are for in writing), but it's got different syntax, because preceding adjectives are not declined for number.

Note the plural years and singular year below:

• A boy eleven years old rescued the princess.


• An eleven-year-old boy rescued the princess.

If you pluralized the second year, or used singular year in the first, they'd be ungrammatical.

Nearby, while it is enough of a single word to precede, still retains enough independence in its two consituents near and by to follow, as well. It's in transition from one state to the other.

Language changes, word by word and phrase by phrase, as we continue to speak it.
In fact, it changes because we continue to speak it.

terminology - What is this construction called?

Example 1:

These sets are potentially infinite, can be subjective, and change all the time.

Example 2:

This is a useful website, a helpful resource, and full of awesome people.

In the first example, the three predicates (" are potentially infinite", "can be subjective" and "change all the time") link back to the subject "These sets". In the second example the three predicates "a useful website", "a helpful resource" and "full of awesome people" all link back to the main verb "is"; the subject and verb don't need to be repeated because they're understood to carry across for the other predicates. Is there a general term for this process, where parts of the sentence (such as but not limited to the subject and verb,) are understood to apply to more than one other part of the sentence?

Answer

1. These sets are potentially infinite, can be subjective, and change all the time.




2. This is a useful website, a helpful resource, and full of awesome people.

Coordination. Your first example involves a coordination of three verb phrases, and that construction works just as you had described. Your second example involves a coordination of predicative complements, and it works just as you had described it.

Your two examples use simple-syndetic coordination--because they use the coordinator "and" only once and there is three or more coordinates.

history - Did English have any plural articles in the past?

I am curious as to whether English had any plural articles like in French with "les" and "des".

Answer

Depending on your point of view, you could say that it has one now: the definite article "the" can be used with plural nouns, although the same form is used with singular nouns.

But if you don't accept that as a real example, you can go back to Old English, where the definite article had not only a different form for the plural, but different forms for three genders and four or five cases. (These forms were not just used as articles in Old English, but also as demonstrative adjectives and pronouns; some of the forms are no longer used as articles but survive as modern English demonstrative adjectives or pronouns. Some of the history of this development is given at the end of the following page: Middle English Morphology.)

The situation with the indefinite article is different; it seems there never was a plural form. The reason why is covered in this question: Why is there no plural indefinite article?

The article "the" before messages

He shouldn't have posted the PM's that were meant to be private. [PM = Private message]

Is the above sentence correct if we are talking about specific messages? Suppose that, on a forum that I am on, one poster sent 2-4 messages to another person in private, who then posted the screenshots of those messages. So wasn't I supposed to say he has "posted THE messages" (I have those 2-4 messages in my mind when I was talking about them there) instead of "posted messages"?

Is "the screenshots of those messages" or simply "screenshots of those messages" correct?

pronouns - Misunderstanding the use of me/him/her/them/us

I'm aware that when the pronoun is also the object of a sentence we use these: me instead of I, them instead of they and so on.

But when I say:

He is a teacher, and her?

Why do I say her instead of she if in this case I cannot identify a direct object.

Also when answering, would I say

Her, she is also a teacher.

or

She, she is also a teacher.

I'm really confused

Pronunciation of "esplanade" and "promenade"

Checking Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary shows that the British and American pronunciations for each of esplanade and promenade differ. Also the way the ending is pronounced for each dialect is different in the two words. Are there any explanations for this phenomenon?

Answer

In English spelling, a silent e at the end of a word usually signifies the preceding vowel should be pronounced as a "long vowel". Some of these words borrowed from other languages are pronounced according to the rule (/eɪd/), others are pronounced more closely to the borrowed word (/ɑːd/).

Both of your words have a French origin.

promenade (1560s) leisurely walk; (1640s) place for walking; (1887) dance given by a school
esplanade (1590s) large level area

There are many other such words in English with a variety of pronunciations, e.g.:

comrade (1590s) one who shares the same room
facade (1650s) front of a building
charade (1776) long talk, chatter

I don't think there is a rule governing the pronunciation of these words. Perhaps some speakers have been influenced by greater exposure to French. That would be consistent with my impression that US speakers prefer the 'anglicised' form. I find their anglicising approach more logical, as for instance, nobody pronounces grenade: /grəˈnɑːd/.

grammar - started+ verb vs. verb

Why most of the time some of the verbs(both infinitives and gerunds) are prefixed with the word started, is it a stylistic matter or does it give a better flow to the statement? Cant we use the base form of the verb without the word start? For example:

Recently in our school, they started teaching/to teach computer philosophy.

quotes - How much punctuation is appropriate when ending a sentence with a full-sentence quotation?

When you end a sentence with a quotation that is itself a full sentence, do you use the quotation's punctuation? The containing sentence's? Both? Something else?

I think this might be best illustrated with an example. Which of the following is correct?

John asked her "Do you have the time?" She said yes.

or

John asked her "Do you have the time." She said yes.

or

John asked her "Do you have the time?." She said yes.

Related, but not a dupe: Is it ever acceptable for a period to come after a quote at the end of a sentence?

grammar - "I and others" or "me and others"

Possible Duplicates:
Which is correct, “you and I” or “you and me”?
When do I use “I” instead of “me?”

Could you please explain more in an answer, so that I and other developers would use benefit.

Could you please explain more in an answer, so that me and other developers would use benefit.

Which one is correct? Why?

meaning - "What it did was" versus "what it did is" versus "what it does is"

I feel a bit uncertain about the use of tense in the above sentence structure.

Which one is grammatically correct and sounds most natural between "what it did was," "what it did is," and "what it does is"?

Answer

"What it did is" has a tense conflict. Since "did" is past tense, it is jarring to use "is" in present tense. "What it did was" is perfectly fine when indicating what something did during a specific event in the past.

"What it does is", on the other hand, doesn't indicate you're describing a specific past event. It indicates that you're either telling us what it is doing now, what it does in general when called upon to do something, or what it would do in a particular situation.

phrases - "List of tasks" or "tasks' list"

Which of these forms is better: list of tasks or tasks' list? Another question is whether I should use an apostrophe or not (tasks's list vs tasks list).

Other phrases which are similar to this, but aren't quite what I'm looking for, are list of projects and task's action (one task this time).

Maybe the answer is obvious, but English is not my native language so I need to understand it.

Answer

The usual phrase is "task list" (without plural or apostrophe).

"List of tasks" is perfectly acceptable, and perhaps preferable in general writing; but in referring to a list (almost like a name for it) "task list" is overwhelmingly the common expression.

"Tasks' list" would be very unusual: the possessive 's and its variants are usually used only for real possession, not for more general relationships; and tend not to be used for abstract nouns, though this is not a firm prohibition.

grammar - In sentences with "too" and "enough" what word does the to-infinitive modify?

When a to-infinitive is used with words like "too" and "enough" what word does it modify? For example

The animal moves too quickly to be captured.

The bag is too heavy to lift.

He is scared enough to fire his gun.

At first I thought the to-infinitive modified the adjectives and adverbs quickly, heavy, and scared, but I got confused on later example sentences.

Bob is too eager to fight.

Bob is too eager to fight to wait.

It seems strange for two to-infinitives to modify an adjective at the same time, when it occurred to me that the to-infinitive may be modifying "too" instead. Is this true? In any case, "to wait" does not seem to modify the same way "to fight" does in the latter sentence, but I haven't found a good explanation on how a to-infinitive like "to wait" works with words like "too" and "enough" in dictionaries. Also, the first three sentences don't make much sense without "too" or "enough". "The animal moves quickly to be captured" has a much different meaning than "the animal moves too quickly to be captured."

One or two apostrophes for two subjects in the possessive case?

Which is correct: [Bonus question: should there be a question mark here instead of a colon?]

The book contains Marx and Engels' theories about the nature of
society and politics.

or

The book contains Marx's and Engels' theories about the nature of
society and politics

It seems to me that the former is more common, but I am confused here since the latter seems more logical to me (and matches what you would see in my native language Icelandic).

word choice - Why do we say "I do not like that" instead of "I dislike that"?

I've noticed that when people dislike something (myself included), they often say they "do not like" it.

"I don't like that car."

"I don't care for hip-hop music."

"No, I don't really like Megan's dress."

But to say you do not like something could mean you also do not particularly dislike something. If to not like something can mean mere indifference, why are we not more specific when stating dislike?

This question came to mind because of a conversation I had earlier this week:
- "Trevor, what do you think of that car?"
- "Hmm, I don't really like it. I don't dislike it, but it just doesn't do anything for me."

Answer

I think your question contains its own answer. Liking something and disliking something are both active things. From the OED:

Like: Find agreeable, enjoyable, or satisfactory

Dislike: Feel distaste for or hostility towards.

To "not like" something would, strictly speaking, imply merely the absence of the agreeable or pleasant reaction that liking something has, but without the distaste or hostility implicit in disliking something.

That said, I'm sure that some, indeed many, people use "don't like" as a euphemism to "soft pedal" the fact that they do actually dislike something. And that they probably do it without conscious thought.

When I think of my work colleagues there are many that I "don't like" but don't dislike either because I really don't know them. But I can think of a handful who I do actively dislike. I probably wouldn't use either term publicly, if only to keep the peace, but if push came to shove I'd more likely use the former rather than the latter for the same reason. Even, perhaps especially, for the one that I don't merely dislike but despise.

As another example (with a nod to your automotive avatar) I "don't like" the Ford Falcon. I don't dislike it either. It evokes no feelings in me one way or the other. But I "disliked" the Holden Astra, because it had as much driver visibility as a Type VII U Boat. You don't so much drive one of those things as "use the Force and hope for the best", so there was a reason to actively dislike it.

In short, while I may sometimes use "don't like" as a euphemism for "dislike", I don't use "dislike" as a synonym for "don't like" but rather reserve the word for when I have an active negative feeling about something. I'm sure I'm not the only one who does that.

singular they - What is a proper gender-neutral form of himself or herself

I am thinking "themself" is a very old deprecated way of saying this. What would be more proper?

An example would be:

One does not simply build Rome themself.

It just seems awkward with "themself."

Answer

Singular they is a usage hallowed by time, and, since reflexive pronouns are inflected on both the pronoun root and the -self/-selves reflexive suffix (e.g, my[sg]-self[sg] vs our[pl]-selves[pl]), the correct reflexive for singular they is themself.

Dictionaries, by the way, are not reliable sources for grammar, just as grammars are not reliable sources for lexical meaning.

word order - Possessive pronouns

Does a first-person possessive pronoun have to come last if it is in a list with others?"

"My irresponsible sister loves jewelry, so she took both Sally's and mine.

"The same room was marked on Joe's and my map."

I know it is much better to simply use a plural pronoun such as our or their, but I can not find the answer to this anywhere.

grammatical number - Can "is" be used with plural nouns?

I'm creating a short slogan describing a website's functions. The website consists of a photos storage function plus discussion boards. This is an attempt to put it shortly:

Example.com is photos plus discussions

Is it correct? Particularly, I'm not sure using "is" with plural nouns is correct.

Answer

The answer to this lies in a bit of 'language algebra.'

First of all, Example.com is singular.

Therefore, you must use the verb is when describing its state of being.

In this example, photos plus discussions is also singular - not in the sense that it is only one thing, but in the sense that it represents a singular idea. Think of it this way:

5 = (2 + 3)

One way to put this mathematical statement into words would be to say

Five is two plus three.

In this illustration, five is singular, and therefore two plus three is also singular in the sense that it is a singular representation of the combination (or sum) of two parts which make up the subject, five. It can be written or said both ways:

Five is (two plus three).

(Two plus three) is five.

Therefore,

Example.com is (photos plus discussions).

However, a better way to write this would be

Example.com is a combination of photos and discussions.

This makes it absolutely clear and eliminates any possibility of confusion or syntactic awkwardness. You may also replace is with consists of for further clarity, although this isn't absolutely necessary. I would leave it as is for the sake of simplicity, but it's up to you.

Hope this helps!

prepositions - Necessity of "in" and "the"?

Please let me know which sentence is correct. I have faced the first and third one in the Longman dictionary, but dictionaries are prone to typos and errors. So I couldn't be sure which one is correct and which one is not. Please help me know.

1. The verb is in the past tense.


2. The verb is in past tense.


3. The verb is past tense.

nouns - Choice of articles: the reduction/ a reduction /reduction

I am often confused about the use of articles before abstract nouns. Are the following three sentences all grammatically correct? If so, what differences are there, if any, in their meaning or nuance?

(1) Obama chose the middle ground, ordering the reduction of U.S. troops to 50,000 by August 2010.

(2) Obama chose the middle ground, ordering a reduction of U.S. troops to 50,000 by August 2010.

(3) Obama chose the middle ground, ordering reduction of U.S. troops to 50,000 by August 2010.

Please assume that this reduction of troops has not been mentioned before this sentence, thus "the reduction" in (1) does not refer to something already mentioned.

punctuation - Should I keep the ellipsis in this sentence?

I was wondering if I am using the ellipsis properly in this sentence. If not, what punctuation should I be using in place of the ellipsis?

"This trick proved to be difficult at times because, as the years progressed, my tics became more and more obvious . . . People were noticing."

Please include any other advice you have for me. Thank you!

Answer

I would use an em dash.

My tics became more and more obvious—people were noticing.

or a colon

My tics became more and more obvious: People were noticing.

phonology - Is the "an" rule applied when a sum of money is in between?

I have recently seen this image:

Should "a" have been used instead of "an" in the "...an $100,000 apartment" part?

Answer

The /ə ~ ən/ rule, like the /ðə ~ ði/ rule, depends completely on the individual sound that follows. What word starts with this sound, or what its meaning or part of speech may be, does not matter at all.

The rules are very simple to state in their entirety:

/ə/ or /ðə/ before Consonants; /ən/ or /ði/ before Vowels

"5" is pronounced /fayv/, and that starts with /f/, which is a Consonant. Therefore use 'a'.

If it were "8" (pronounced /et/) instead, it would start with a Vowel, and one would use 'an'.

Note that this has nothing to do with spelling, and only refers to pronunciation.

past tense - Is the question "If you didn't break the vase, who did?" a conditional sentence?

My problem is that I was taught (I think wrongly) that whenever a conditional sentence refers to past, there should be past perfect tense in the if clause, as in example 1.

Example 1:

If you hadn't broken the vase, you wouldn't have angered your parents.
[He broke the vase, no doubt about it.]

But is example 2 still a conditional sentence, and is it correct?

Example 2:

If you didn't break the vase, who did?

We're still referring to past, but we don't really know whether he did it or not.

Is this an example of a conditional sentence? Why or why not? How do I recognize a "past" conditional sentence?

Answer

Example 2 means

If you didn't break the vase, then I ask you who did?

The condition is on the speech act of questioning. If you did break the vase, than I needn't ask. Compare:

If you don't mind my asking, who broke the vase?

The condition here is also a condition on my asking the question. This is a general formula -- to be polite, you mention conditions that might make it inappropriate to ask a question.

How manieth as an ordinal number question

Possible Duplicates:
How should I phrase a question that must be answered with an ordinal number (e.g., the third prime)?
How to ask a question to get an ordinal number answer

In my native tongue, Malayalam, there is a question word - "ethraamathe" - which we use to get an ordinal number as answer. In other Indian languages, and also in many foreign languages like Dutch and German, such a question word does exist. But in English there is no one word for such a question.

I have once read in a Phantom strip cartoon book from US a sentence that uses what number. Using this expression it is easy to ask "What number president of America was Abraham Lincoln?" to which one would answer "16th". A professor from Oxford University has said in one of his letters to me that what number can be used in informal speech. In his opinion, "Where in the numerical order did Abraham Lincoln come as President of America?" can be used in writing.

I would like to know whether American and British people use ‘what number’ in their speech.
Some Indians also use how manieth as an ordinal number question.

grammatical number - Can 'the magazine' be used with plural agreement to refer to the editor and staff collectively?

If I am referring to a magazine as an entity comprising its editor and staff, is it correct to say, 'The magazine are keen for submissions' or 'The magazine is keen for submissions'?

(I'm correcting an Australian English text, where they use The magazine are... when referring to the corporate entity.)

grammar - It seems to be correct for / to me

While I answered a question, I wrote the following sentence to say that I agreed with the solution given by the OP.

It seems to be correct for me.

Then, I wondered whether the following sentence would be better or not:

It seems to be correct to me.

It seems that both are used on the Internet, but is one of them incorrect? or maybe with difference meanings?

Answer

The comment

It seems to be correct for me

implies that what you are referring to — in this case, the OP's solution — is correct for you specifically (for instance, because of the particular circumstances you find yourself in),

whereas

It seems [to be] correct to me

means that you think it is definitively correct.

Dilemma between present perfect simple and past simple

I do not know where to find the right answer. Please tell and explain what my errors are

I must use either the Present Perfect Simple or Past Simple

 B. How long / you / have /that?
 A. We / have / it since the kids / be / tiny. It / belong / to my parents before us, so it / be / the family holiday home for a long time.
 B. / you / go / there when you / be / a child?
 A. Yes. Then my father / want / to sell it so I / buy / it.

My version

 B: How long have you had that?
 A: We've had it since the kids were tiny. It's belonged to my parents before us, so it has been the family holiday home for a long time.
 B: Did you go there when you were a child?
 A: Yes. Then my father wanted to sell it so I bought it.

I am not sure about the solution in bold. Should it be “it belonged” or “it's belonged”? Is it OK to use the Present Perfect and Past Simple together in the same sentence?

punctuation - Comma placement when using quotes that end with a question mark

I've been writing a letter to an editor, and one line of my response reads:

In your article "What Makes Free Will Free?" you mention...

My question is: where should I place a comma to transition from the quoted article title to words you mention... after it? Should I place the comma in the quotes, or outside the quotes? Traditionally, I would place it in the quotes, but I wasn't too sure if I could place a comma right after a question mark like that.

Answer

The quotes here delimit the article title. Since the comma is not part of the title, it belongs outside of the quotes. If this were a book title, it would be either italicized or underlined, but the comma would not. The same logic should apply here.

grammaticality - For + verb-ing at the beginning of a sentece

Is the following sentence structure grammatically correct? I mean, I've found a lot of examples that have this structure but not at the beginning of the phrase but with a subject before. Here is an example I'm trying:

For designing the 3D model of a new tool it's necessary to be sure...

UPDATE: This is the research I've done:

For + verb-ing: the purpose of an object
However, if we are talking about the purpose of an object or an action, we normally use the for + verb-ing pattern. Note that this pattern commonly answers the question: What are they (used) for? Compare the following:

Schools are for educating children not for entertaining them.
Schools are for learning. Life is for living.
This kitchen knife is especially useful for slicing vegetables.
What's this for? ~ It's for opening oysters. It's much better than a knife.
What's this fifty pound note for? ~ It's for buying food for the weekend.

Note that when the subject of the sentence is a person rather than the thing described, the to + infinitive pattern is also possible:

I use this small knife to slice vegetables with.
I use this gadget to open shellfish with.

As it is explained it can be used with a subject before, but I haven't been able to find anywhere something explaining the case when For + verb-ing is at the beginning of a sentence

Answer

There are sentences that start with "for verbing" but that one isn't a particularly good one:

For eating right away, I prefer Macintosh apples.

For fitting into a small space, the Smart Car is terrific.

For educating children, schools are the usual solution.

So if your question is "can I do this?" the answer is yes. If your question is something else ("What is this called?" "Is there generally a better way to word these sentences?" "Is my particular example grammatical?") then I suggest you edit the question to include an actual question.

Can someone please tell the Usage of "its" in the following is correct?

Here is a quote from "Ever Wonder Why / the color red angers a bull? " (page 20).

It has been suggested that this reaction to red (my note: of bull which is color-blind to a shaking cape in red) may be due to its being the color of blood.

My question : the above "its" should be "it"?

grammar - About usage of will

Do you think this sentence is wrong?

• If you will go there, I will go there too maybe.

http://www.dictionary.com/browse/will?s=t

The will have following menaings.

3. am (is, are, etc.) expected or required to


4. may be expected or supposed to

Q1. So, I think the sentence is correct. but i'm not sure.
What do you think about it?

Q2. Should I use the definite article in the title?

About usage of will vs. About the usage of will

Which one is more suitable for the title?

Answer

The conditional sentences type 1 there are 2 clauses: if clause (if + simple present) and main clause (simple future).
so I think we don't need to put "will" in the if clause.
If you go there, I will go there too maybe.
If you say "If you will go there, I will go there too", the sentence has a different meaning: If you are willing to go there, I am willing to go there too

Verb + to infinitive or Verb + ...ing

Is there a general rule whether to use the Verb + to infinitive or the Verb + ...ing format?

There are cases in which I can't decide which one to use.
Like:
-They can't afford to go out very often.
-They can't afford going out very often.
Or:
-I don't mind to wait.
-I don't mind waiting.
Or:
-It was a nice day, so we decided to go for a walk.

-It was a nice day, so we decided going for a walk.

orthography - Is the possessive of "one" spelled "ones" or "one's"?

I've been confused about this as long as I can remember. Should it be:

One should do ones duty.

or

One should do one's duty.

I'm guessing it should be the latter. But that doesn't sit well with the possessive pronoun 'its'. For example:

It is its own purpose.

vs.

It is it's own purpose.

Here, the former seems clearly correct.

Answer

The correct answer is one's!

All possessives get an apostrophe, except the standard possessive pronouns and these are:

yours, his, hers, ours, theirs, its

Apart of these, always add an apostrophe.

syntactic analysis - What is grammatically incorrect with the sentence: "Moving to a new town and making new friends is hard for people of all ages."?

What is grammatically incorrect with the sentence: "Moving to a new town and making new friends is hard for people of all ages."?

Is it the subject/verb agreement?

possessives - How do I express the possession of multiple objects by one proper noun and one pronoun?

As far as I can tell, my question is not a duplicate of either of these two similar questions. It is very close (maybe a duplicate, but I don't quite think so) of this question.

I want to construct a sentence, where there are two things each possessed by one of two people, one of whom is myself. The best I have come up with is something like:

Fred's and my houses are both green.

Two houses, two people (Fred and myself). I'm not sure how to phrase it at all!

I suppose I could go with a longer form like:

Fred's house is green and my house is also green.

But it would be nice if there was a shorter form.

word choice - What is the difference between: "two-day" and "two days"

I would like to know which would be the correct form:

• a major two-day auction


• a major two days auction

The duration of the auction is two days. Which form is the right one to use?

commas - Proper punctuation of “John’s last words were ‘———’ ”

When attributing a quote to someone, you put a comma before the quote:

John said, "———"

But is the comma still used in the following sentence?

John's last words were, "———."

Or should there be something else instead? A colon maybe?

Answer

Many publishers still seem to use commas before quotations, as in your first example, but Larry Trask argued persuasively against doing so:

A sentence containing a quotation is punctuated exactly like any other
sentence apart from the addition of the quotation marks. You should
not insert additional punctuation marks into the sentence merely to
warn the reader that a quotation is coming up: that's what the
quotation marks are for. Hence the first two of the following are bad
style, and the third one is wrong:

*President Nixon declared, "I am not a crook."

*President Nixon declared: "I am not a crook."

*President Nixon declared:- "I am not a crook."

The comma and the colon in the first two are completely pointless,
while the startling
arsenal of punctuation in the third is grotesque. (Remember, a colon
can never be followed by a hyphen or a dash.) Here is the sentence
with proper punctuation: President Nixon declared "I am not a crook."
Adding more dots and squiggles to this perfectly clear sentence would
do absolutely nothing to improve it. No punctuation mark should be

used if it is not necessary.

‘The Cambridge Guide to English Usage’ largely endorses this approach, describing the comma before a quotation as an ‘older convention’.

There is even less of a need for a comma in your second example.

grammar - "Types of" followed by singular or plural?

When using the phrase "types of" or "kinds of," it often seems appropriate to follow with a singular noun (e.g., types of rock), but at other times a plural noun sounds better (e.g., types of sentences). Is there some kind of rule about this?

Answer

I think your essential concern is about countable vs. uncountable nouns. Countable nouns can be singular or plural; uncountable nouns are singular. Some words can be both, in different meanings.

Take a look at this example discussing countable and uncountable nouns:

The coffees I prefer are Arabica and Brazilian.
(Here coffees refers to different types of coffee)

You could write, "The types of coffee I prefer are Arabica and Brazilian."

So with your example:

The rocks I like are basalt and granite. [Rocks are countable]

The types of rock I like are basalt and granite. [Rock is uncountable]

When rock is taking on the uncountable meaning, it's not one rock - it's the idea of rock, the general concept. The only senses in which this is familiar to me are the "solid mineral" one and rock as in "rock music," where you might say, "The types of rock I like are grunge and punk."

Contrast the other part of your example:

The sentences I like are about geology. [Sentences are countable]

The types of sentences I like are about geology. [Sentences are still countable]

Sentences don't have an uncountable meaning:

*The types of sentence I like are about geology. [Ungrammatical for most speakers, I think]