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Sixinone Posted 18 years ago
Grammar

The Sky's the Limit

Hello everyone. I'm new here, and a native English speaker with what I consider a pretty firm grasp of the rules of Grammar. My question stems from an argument I had with a coworker about the image below. Here is the scenario:

Painted in 12" high letters on the blank wall outside the CEO's office at the multi-billion dollar hedge fund I interned at this summer, was the following phrase:

"When a team of dedicated individuals work together as one... the skies the limit" - Anonymous

Now I saw two problems here; the first issue is not as glaring as the second.

1. According to my understanding of English grammar, the word work should in fact be works since it is referring to the team (singular) not the individuals.

2. The problem that bothered me the most, and that I brought up with my coworkers was that skies, as far as my understanding of the English language goes, should DEFINITELY be sky's.

When I brought this up to a coworker who had been around longer than I had, she said the "skies" issue had come up before and some found "on the internet" that "skies" was correct. I still refuse to believe this is correct, and now that I'm done with my internship (and have fallen out of touch with my high school grammar teachers) I figured I would find my own answers on the internet.

Here is a link to the painting.

Now I am asking you to help me. Please tell me whether or not I am correct, or what your opinions are about the sentence, I don't know where else to turn!!

--Alex

  

Top answer

Hello 6-in-1, and welcome to English Forums. 1-- Team can be considered as a single unit or as a group of people in different contexts (and I think the British tend to think of them as one, while the Americans tend to think of them as several individuals-- but I may have that vice versa). Consider: Our team is going to the Olympics .

— Mister Micawber

  • Hello 6-in-1, and welcome to English Forums.
  • 1-- Team can be considered as a single unit or as a group of people in different contexts (and I think the British tend to think of them as one, while the Americans tend to think of them as several individuals-- but I may have that vice versa).
  • Consider: Our team is going to the Olympics .
  • (One team, one unit) Our team are always fighting among themselves .
  • (Several individuals.
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2 Answers
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Hello 6-in-1, and welcome to English Forums.

1-- Team can be considered as a single unit or as a group of people in different contexts (and I think the British tend to think of them as one, while the Americans tend to think of them as several individuals-- but I may have that vice versa). Consider:

Our team is going to the Olympics. (One team,
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sixinone1. According to my understanding of English grammar, the word work should in fact be works since it is referring to the team (singular) not the individuals.
Plurality is not governed solely by grammatical rules, but also by the speaker's feel. Do you say "a number of people is" or a "number of people are". Acco
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