Fundamentals of Editing

Fundamentals of Editing

Lecture 4th 

(Number) Fewer – napkins count

(Amount) Less – money (quantity) no count

Quiz
who/whom

Modifiers
in addition to all mistakes

Stylebook – p. 439, p. 395

No commas, unless its nonrestrictive

Audience, team – collective noun (more than one)

Can be either a singular or a plural verb

Thinking of them as a unit, then it’s a singular verb

Example: The audience was silent – SING. 

Example: The individuals were stamping their feet – PLUR. 

Example: The family pays $50 

Example: The family are all sick 

The ship with all its crew was lost at sea.

Since the singular noun (ship) agrees with verb (was), it’s a singular verb.

If the first noun is singular, then the entire sentence becomes singular.

The meat plus packaging weighs a lot.

Singular noun as well, since meat and weighs are both singular verbs and agree with each other.

Everyone, anyone, anything, each} singular

Everyone wants his money back] – inaccurate

Everyone wants their money back] – accurate

Change the structure of the sentence, so for instance: All of the people want their money back OR everyone wants his or her money back

Each of the three students comes from a different country

6. Not only… but also

neither… nor

either… or

Neither the students nor the teacher is happy.

We say “is” happy, because of the closest noun to the verb. Thus, because “the teacher” is the closest to “is”, it becomes a singular noun.

BUT if the students and teacher mixed up places in the sentence, it will become a PLURAL sentence.

THIS RULE ONLY APPLIES TO not only… or

8.  Words ending with ics takes on a singular verb or plural verb in some instances.

economics, statistics, politics, athletics] – singular verb as a course of study