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DiscordDispute Posted 8 years ago
Grammar

What is the subject of this sentence?

I was in a lengthy argument over the following sentence. I would deeply appreciate if someone could help us resolve this misunderstanding. We are trying to determine what is the subject of this sentence.


Sentence: >1/29 people in the USA is an illegal immigrant

View #1: One, out of 29 people, in the USA is an illegal immigrant.

Argument: One is a pronoun so it is clearly the subject here. "One is an illegal immigrant"

Response: This is not the original meaning of the sentence. There are not 29 people in the USA.

View #2: 1 out of 29 people in the USA is an illegal immigrant

Argument: One is used as a number because you can't say Craig out of 29 people in the USA is an illegal immigrant. The subject is people.

Response: "We're talking about eggs. There are eggs in this basket. One is rotten." This means "One [egg] is rotten." It does not mean "One (the numeral) is rotten," as if it could stink up a number line.

View #3: One out of 29 people in the USA is an illegal immigrant

Argument: This is an implied statement. The implication is one person out of 29 people in the USA is an illegal immigrant. The subject is one.

Response: This only makes sense for a command. There is no omission of the subject.

  

Top answer

DiscordDispute View #1: One, out of 29 people, in the USA is an illegal immigrant. The commas are wrong there. DiscordDispute Argument: One is a pronoun so it is clearly the subject here.

— Mister Micawber

  • DiscordDispute View #1: One, out of 29 people, in the USA is an illegal immigrant.
  • The commas are wrong there.
  • DiscordDispute Argument: One is a pronoun so it is clearly the subject here.
  • Right.
  • DiscordDispute View #2: 1 out of 29 people in the USA is an illegal immigrantArgument: One is used as a number Right.
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3 Answers
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DiscordDisputeView #1: One, out of 29 people, in the USA is an illegal immigrant.

The commas are wrong there.

DiscordDisputeArgument: One is a pronoun so it is clearly the subject here.

Right.

DiscordDisputeView #2: 1 out of 29 people in the USA is an illegal immigrantArgument: One is us
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One out of 29 people in the USA is an illegal immigrant.


One cannot be the subject since it is head of the determinative phrase one out of 29, which serves merely as a quantifier of people, the head word of the subject NP.

The subject is the noun phrase one out of 29 people in the USA, in which people is the head word, one o

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I'd like to add just a few brief comments.


I usually hear and say this as follows.

One out of every 29 people in the USA is an illegal immigrant.

Six out of every 29 people in the USA are illegal immigrants.

Here, one and six are nouns. They would be adjectives if you said 'one person', 'six people'.


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