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Guest Posted 22 years ago
Grammar
What is a formal subject?
Hello. About one week ago, I posted the following question........
In the sentence......."There are/is a dog and cat over there.:..... which form of "be" do I use here? Why? Thank you.
Somebody was nice enough to give me the following answer:
The correct sentence is
“There are a dog and a cat over there”
just because there are two of them. However, in the sentence
“There is a dog accompanied by a cat”
meaning much the same, the singular form is to be used because the formal subject is singular
I've searched the internet to tryto understand what a formal subject is. But, I can't seem to find an answer. Could you please tell me what a formal subject is???
Thank you.
In the sentence......."There are/is a dog and cat over there.:..... which form of "be" do I use here? Why? Thank you.
Somebody was nice enough to give me the following answer:
The correct sentence is
“There are a dog and a cat over there”
just because there are two of them. However, in the sentence
“There is a dog accompanied by a cat”
meaning much the same, the singular form is to be used because the formal subject is singular
I've searched the internet to tryto understand what a formal subject is. But, I can't seem to find an answer. Could you please tell me what a formal subject is???
Thank you.
Top answer
'Formal subject' means the grammatical subject. ' However, the grammatical (= formal) subjects are different. In the first, it is 'a dog and a cat', and in the second, it is 'a dog'.
- 'Formal subject' means the grammatical subject.
- ' However, the grammatical (= formal) subjects are different.
- In the first, it is 'a dog and a cat', and in the second, it is 'a dog'.
- Hence the first sentence takes a plural verb, and the second a singular one.
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2 Answers
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'Formal subject' means the grammatical subject.
The meanings of the two sentences are essentially the same:
'There are a dog and a cat over there.'
'There is a dog accompanied by a cat over there.'
However, the grammatical (= formal) subjects are different. In the first, it is 'a dog and a cat', and in the second, it is 'a dog'. Hence the first sentence takes a
The meanings of the two sentences are essentially the same:
'There are a dog and a cat over there.'
'There is a dog accompanied by a cat over there.'
However, the grammatical (= formal) subjects are different. In the first, it is 'a dog and a cat', and in the second, it is 'a dog'. Hence the first sentence takes a
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Really, a formal subject is is a dummy subject. It is not the real subject in the sentence, so it happens that when we need to lay emphasis on the suject we shift it from its normal position in the sentence. Instead of.....Subject + Verb , we use Verb + suject. But, as we can´t use the verb without a subject, we have to replace it with something that could function as the subject. That Formal Sub
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