Chapter 6. Agreement, Pronouns and Common Errors
Subject–verb agreement. A verb agrees with its subject in number [3][11].
Each, every, either, neither and everyone take a singular verb: Each of the students has a book.
Subjects joined by and are plural: Tom and Mary are here.
With or / nor, the verb agrees with the nearer subject: Neither the teacher nor the students were late.
Collective nouns (team, committee) take a singular verb in American usage and may take a plural verb in British usage when the members are emphasized.
Ignore words that come between subject and verb: The box of chocolates is on the table.
Pronouns
| Type | Examples |
| Personal (subject) | I, you, he, she, it, we, they |
| Personal (object) | me, you, him, her, it, us, them |
| Possessive | my/mine, your/yours, his, her/hers, its, our/ours, their/theirs |
| Reflexive | myself, yourself, themselves |
| Relative | who, whom, whose, which, that |
| Demonstrative | this, that, these, those |
| Indefinite | someone, anyone, nobody, all |
Pronoun case and reference. Use subject pronouns as subjects (She and I went) and object pronouns as objects (He gave it to her and me). Use who for subjects and whom for objects: To whom did you speak? A pronoun should clearly refer to one noun [8][11].
Frequent errors [7][8][9]:
Dangling modifier: “Walking to school, the rain started.” Fix: “As I walked to school, the rain started.”
Misplaced modifier: “She almost drove the children to school every day” (ambiguous). Place modifiers next to the words they modify.
Double negatives: avoid “I don’t have no time”; say “I don’t have any time.”
Faulty parallelism: “She likes swimming, to run and cycling” should be “She likes swimming, running and cycling.”
Fewer / less: traditionally, fewer for countable nouns (fewer books) and less for uncountable ones (less water).
Good / well: good is an adjective, well is usually an adverb (She sings well).
Review: Choose the correct form: “Each of the students (has/have) finished.” (Answer: has.)