notional v-s agreement

[baijioubloke]

I signed up, continuing the topic of an old thread which attracted some seemingly keen minds, in the hope that I can benefit*.

Li Ming: "Her acting is very good."
Bill: "And so are her singing & dancing."

This screams out to me as clunky, unnatural and rule governed. So much so that I proposed that students change the text in the book & received enquiries as to why.

I could have fielded these better.

I'm regarding S&D as activites of a performer (conceptual proximity?) which don't have to be performed simultaneously in order to change the verb form from the norm.

And, dammit - are just sounds wrong!!
But "so are her singing & dancing abilities" doesn't.

But I'm stumped if I can generate other strings to replicate this apparent exception.
Maybe this..........which works 'better' with connected speech.

She's trash!
And so's her brother and her uncle.

My head hurts now - whats going on?
Am I throwing the class NS English?

*The response in the China forum started well, but closed with "who cares?" (nice buch of people over there....)

[woodcutter]

You have to apply HARZER'S RULE.

You better ask Harzer about it.

As far as I can tell we have wide latitude to make different agreements, especially in recent years, and it isn't a matter to be heavily corrective about.