Grammar Questions

Dorkyelmo · March 13, 2012, 10:41am

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For number 10, I picked A because it seems correct. But the answer is D.

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Ditto. The answer is B.

johnnyzxz · March 13, 2012, 10:48am

Both of those are fairly simple. You should definitely look into silverturtles grammar guide.

Sent from my HTC Wildfire S using CC

Dorkyelmo · March 13, 2012, 11:21am

They are simplistic. But I still can’t see the parallelism in the second example.

First one, ditto. I guessed

silverturtle · March 13, 2012, 12:19pm

For the first one, (A) is wrong because it incorrectly employs a relative pronoun. Here is an example of a correctly applied relative clause:

I like apple pie, which was invented by a pumpkin patch.

The pronoun “which” appropriately refers to “apple pie” and allows as a link so that “apple pie” can serve as the subject of “was invented.” Here’s your sentence:

The heat was already overwhelming and lasted a week, which duration made it seem sheer torture.

Likewise “which” refers to some noun or noun phrase in the independent clause, and whatever that is acts as the subject of “made it seem sheer torture.” Logically, we infer that “which” refers to the extended stay of the heat, but pronoun reference guidelines dictate that the pronoun reference must be explicit: The precise referent must appear in the sentence.

In apparent response to this problem, the sentence tries to resolve the matter by sticking “duration” after “which,” but “which” is a pronoun on its own and does correctly take an adjacent noun just for clarifying purposes. But here is a case in which you could stick a noun next to “which”:

Which movie do you want to watch?

There “which” is an interrogative pronoun.

As for choice (D), it may seem a bit funky because it observes the technical rule that a pronoun modifier of a gerund (which in this case is “lasting”) ought to be in the possessive case (“its” rather than “it”). This is because gerunds are functional nouns (noun verbals); accordingly, they can serve as subjects (here, of “made it seem”) and are modified by possessive pronouns.

In contrast, a participle, which is often spelled exactly as the corresponding gerund, is a functional adjective and therefore is not modified as a pronoun: The participle is the one that’s doing the modifying. You must use context to determine whether the participial or gerundial form is being used. Here’s an example:

His lasting the whole tournament is a shock. (“lasting” is gerund and subject of “is.”)

The runner lasting the whole tournament is a really impressive guy. (“lasting [the whole tournament]” modified “runner”; “lasting” is a participle here. Conceptualize this as equivalent to using a relative clause, which are aptly otherwise dubbed adjective clauses: “The runner that lasted the whole tournament is a really impressive guy.”)

silverturtle · March 13, 2012, 12:41pm

Second question: Parsing a bit of the syntax is always a good way to solve questions that may involve faulty parallelism. But there’s somewhat of a complicating matter here: “whether” functions a bit loosely when it comes to syntax. In contrast to the easy rule that we can apply to correlative conjunctions (“either…or”, “neither…nor”, etc.), the two objects separated by “or” or “nor” that follow “whether” do not have to entirely agree.

Here’s how we would analyze parallelism for correlative conjunctions:

I want neither [to walk] nor [run]. should be

I want neither [to walk] nor [to run]. or I want to neither [walk] nor [run]. (In the latter sentence, “to” carries to both objects by appearing before “neither.”)

Strict and easy: Both objects must be perfectly parallel.

But here’s the liberal stuff we can do with “whether”:

I don’t know whether [he’s ready] or [not]. (The “or not” phrase is a quick way to avoid crafting a parallel phrase, such as “he’s not ready.”)

I don’t know whether he’s ready. (In fact, we can accept “or not” as implicit and excise it utterly.)

I don’t know whether [he’s ready] or [not ready]. (The subject effectively carries to both objects.)

We can’t do anything, though. For example, gerund-gerund and infinitive-infinitive agreement is one flavor of parallelism that cannot escape the tenuous grasp of “whether”:

We can’t decide whether running or to walk is the better idea. should be

We can’t decide whether to run or to walk is the better idea. or We can’t decide whether running or walking is the better idea.

But we do have the freedom to rephrase the first correction as

We can’t decide whether to run or walk is the better idea.

So the problem with the question you provide isn’t really a lack of parallelism. The answer is simply that “are” and “they” are reversed. Currently, the predication is interrogative: Are they done? Let’s make it declarative: “they are.” Rewrite:

The question of whether certain chemical fertilizers are a curse or they are a blessing is still being debated.

It could also be:

The of whether certain chemical fertilizers are a curse or a blessing is still being debated.

Hope these help.

Dorkyelmo · March 13, 2012, 1:37pm

That helped a lot. Thanks a lot silverturtle!

JefferyJung · March 13, 2012, 4:50pm

Silverturtle/

I don’t know if you’ll see this post, but I have a little question about something that you posted.

Shouldn’t the sentence:

The runner lasting the whole tournament is a really impressive guy.

be changed to

The runner, lasting the whole tournament, is a really impressive guy.

I always thought participial phrases were separated by commas(perhaps the commas are optional?) Also, I was taught that participial phrases were allowed to be attached anywhere in the sentence, though some are preferable to others. As in:

The runner, lasting the whole tournament, is a really impressive guy.
The runner is a really impressive guy, lasting the whole tournament.
Lasting the whole tournament, the runner is a really impressive guy.

silverturtle · March 13, 2012, 5:39pm

It’s a matter of restrictive versus non-restrictive modification. Either one can be correct, depending on context. They have subtly different meanings.

The first sentence (an instance of restrictive modification) implies that there are multiple runners to which I could be referring and that the participial phrase is necessary to the identification of the subject; that is, the participial phrase restricts the number of runners that I could be referring to down to only those that lasted the whole tournament.

The second sentence’s participial phrase non-restrictively modifies “runner.” The implication is that we have previously identified the runner or there is only one runner that we could be referring to, so we offset the phrase in commas.

The concept applies similarly to relative pronouns. Restrictive:

The runner who lasted the whole tournament is a really impressive guy.

Non-restrictive:

The runner, who lasted the whole tournament, is a really impressive guy.

For impersonal objects of modification, “which” is used in non-restrictive modification (with comma) and either “which” or “that” is used in restrictive modification (without comma). The concept of restrictive or non-restrictive modification also affects the way in which we punctuate apposition, which I discussed very briefly in my guide.

There is indeed flexibility in the placement of participial phrases. But when they are placed to flank the clause whose subject is the object of modification, as in your latter two example sentences, the modification is necessarily non-restrictive; we lose the ability to alter the punctuation to change the meaning. So here we would have to ensure that it is exophorically clear which runner we mean.

Note as well that the flanking participial phrase must modify the subject of the clause, lest we risk ambiguity.

JefferyJung · March 13, 2012, 9:00pm

Thank you for your answer.

All the sentences are grammatically sound sentences. They just carry different implications. It’s truly fascinating to see that little alterations in the sentences such as the addition of commas can be so crucial to accurately depict the writer’s intentions.

teteatete · March 13, 2012, 9:11pm

While there are super grammar gurus here, I figure I could drop a question of mine.

<a href=“http://i.imgur.com/cPYdP.jpg[/url]”>http://i.imgur.com/cPYdP.jpg</a>

Can anyone identify the answer and offer an explanation?

JefferyJung · March 13, 2012, 9:45pm

The correct idiom is “interest in”.

I don’t think I can offer a lengthy explanation.

fogcity · March 14, 2012, 11:49am

The post from teteatete is whether or not "interest to revive … " is correct usage. As JeffreyJung notes the correct preposition to use with “interest” is “in”. There really isn’t a deeper explanation for this.

So the correct replacement for "Interest to revive … " is:

“Interest in reviving …”

My understanding is that this question appeared on an actual SAT (January 2011?).

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