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Maple Posted 18 years ago
Grammar

singular or plural? what concern(s)

0A) What concerns me is two facts.02br
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00B) What concern me are two facts.02br
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00Which one is correct? 02br
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00(I find there exists a paradox. 01b01i00A02i02b00 can be correct, because the predicate accords not to the object, but to the subject, whose morph seems singular. B can also be correct, because 01i01b00what02b02i00 can be substituted with "01i01b00things which02b02i00", thus the subject is plural. What do you think?02br
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00Thanks in advance!0-
  

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— Yoong Liat

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10 Answers
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0To me, (A) is correct.0-
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0Thank you, Yoong Liat!02br
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00I googled 01b00"what concern me" site:www.nytimes.com02b00 and found this: 02br
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00These people - their footprints, actually - are what concern me now. I said they follow the trail, and strictly speaking this is true. ...02br
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00Any more comments?02br
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0The idiomatic expression is:02br
01i01b00What concerns me (is)02br
02b02i02br
00so that A follows automatically. 0-
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1i00What02i00 sometimes seems to have a plural force but nevertheless requires a singular verb. Clearly we would say 01i00What is needed is a spotlight02i00, but what if 01i00spotlights02i00 - the plural form - is used.instead. 02br
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00The options are these:02br
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00 What is needed
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0Honestly, in cases like this - rewrite! There are two facts that concern me.0-
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0Thank you YL, MH, and GG! Your comments are all very helpful indeed!0-
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1blockquote
01cite10Maple12cite10 googled 11b10"what concern me" site:www.nytimes.com12b10 and found this: 12br
10These people - their footprints, actually - are what concern me now. I said they follow the trail, and strictly speaking this is true. ...12br
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12blockquote
10Hi,02
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0Kooyeen,02br
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00In the parallel pattern, 00“what bothers me the most…”, or “what kills me the most…,00 is frequently treated as a singular scenario. 00“what concerns me is00 …” should be treated likewise. What follows could be singular or plural which should be separate from this structure. Since “what” is unknown, it should be treated as singular, such a
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0Thank you Kooyeen, for participating this discussion!02br
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00Thank you Goodman! 01blockquote
01font10Since “what” is unknown, it should be treated as singular,10 This is new to me, and I find this kind of generalization interesting. 12font12br
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11font12font
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Cal Thomas's editorial column for Monday, March 1, 2010 contains a good example of this problem. Discussing the topic of Republicans and the midterm elections, he wrote, "So much of what passes for facts today are like what another generation called 'old wives' tales.'"

Most of your readers agree that WHAT should take a singular verb, but when the writer goes on and adds ARE later in th
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