The Alps is/are?

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heyiamhere
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The Alps is/are?

Post by heyiamhere » Tue Sep 06, 2005 12:21 pm

In the following words, can I treat them as both plural and singular?
My guess is (is)(are)(is).

The Alps is/are ? (is)
The rocky mountains is/are ? (are)
The philliphines is/are ? (is)

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The Alps is the collective name for one of the great mountain range systems of Europe, stretching from Austria in the east, Slovenia, Italy, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Germany, through to France in the west
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The Alps are a range of mountains located within the Moon's Mare Imbrium, formed in the impact that created the Imbrium Basin.


http://encyclopedia.laborlawtalk.com/Alps

Andrew Patterson
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Post by Andrew Patterson » Tue Sep 06, 2005 12:45 pm

Yes.

LarryLatham
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Post by LarryLatham » Tue Sep 06, 2005 6:02 pm

Quite. But note: the first sentence refers to a (singular) name, while the second refers to a collection of mountains. The same trick works for just about any noun.

"Dogs is the collective name we use for a group of friendly animals with wiggley tails and floppy ears."

Larry Latham

Stephen Jones
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Post by Stephen Jones » Tue Sep 06, 2005 6:28 pm

There are three factors affecting agreement between subject and verb in English:
a) "grammatical" agreement; that is to say if the subject is plural it should take a plural verb, and if it is singular, or uncountable, it should take a singular one.
b) Notional agreement; that is if the subject is considered semantically as a collection of discrete objects it takes a plural verb, and if it is considered as an amorphous collectivity it takes a singular verb. Linked with this is
bii) Copulative agreement. That is to say the linking verb should be the same number as the copula.
c) Proximal agreement (sometimes called 'spurious agreement' though pure descriptivists would shun such a judgemental description). That is to say, the verb should agree with the noun that comes immediately before it.

Now a well-formed English sentence should follow all of these precepts and most do. The problem comes when it is necessary to choose one over the other.

With most collective nouns there is no problem. 'The police is/are' 'the committee says/say' is a question of notional agreement and personal or regional preference. Neither choice violates a) or c). But when one deals with grammatically plural collectives such as 'The Alps' and 'The Rockies' (and even more so with 'The Rocky Mountains') any use of a singular verb is going to violate grammatical and proximal agreement. Accordingly, rare will be the occaisons where they are used with a singular verb. Indeed I would say that even copulative agreement is not strong enough to overcome the pressures for a plural verb
The Alps are one of the most important topographical features in Europe.
?The Alps is one of the most important topographical features in Europe.


Now with country names the question is whether they have become opaque or not. That is to say do we think of one country when we say 'The Philippines' or a discrete set of islands named after Philip II of Spain. I think notional agreement is in control here, and when talking about them as a political entity we would tend to use the singular and when talking about them as a geographical feature, the plural. On the other hand 'The Cayman Islands' is transparent, and there will be more resisitance to using the singular verb, even when referring to the political entity.
The Philippines is one of the main exporters of manpower to the developed world.
The Cayman Islands lead the world in offshore finance.

This appears to be backed up by Google which have twice as many entries for the singular verb as for the plural with 'The Philippines' but 30% more with the plural than with the singular for 'The Cayman Islands'.

LarryLatham
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Post by LarryLatham » Tue Sep 06, 2005 6:46 pm

Well done, Stephen!
:)
Larry Latham

heyiamhere
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Post by heyiamhere » Wed Sep 07, 2005 1:29 pm

Thanks :)
It really clears everything up!

Metamorfose
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Post by Metamorfose » Wed Sep 07, 2005 1:56 pm

'The police is/are'
So one can use a singular verb with 'police'? I was taught that only plural verbs were possible.

José

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Lorikeet
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Post by Lorikeet » Wed Sep 07, 2005 3:38 pm

Metamorfose wrote:
'The police is/are'
So one can use a singular verb with 'police'? I was taught that only plural verbs were possible.

José
Maybe Stephan can, but I can't. ;) Then again, American English uses a singular where I hear British English uses a plural (committee, family, class, etc.) so maybe "police" is the opposite.

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Post by Andrew Patterson » Wed Sep 07, 2005 4:47 pm

You can only use the plural with "police" because it is a plural noun like "cattle": the police are, the cattle are. It is not the same as nouns that can be interpreted either way like "team" or "committee" the team is/are, the committee is/are. This should be obvious because a synonym of "police" is "cops" we can have one cop or more than one cop but there is no singular of "police" as such.

Perhaps the confusion comes from the use of police with compound nouns where the word acts like an adjective. Here we have to say, "the police officier is," etc.

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Post by LarryLatham » Wed Sep 07, 2005 5:59 pm

The police is what we call our "coppers" here in America.

Larry Latham

JuanTwoThree
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Post by JuanTwoThree » Wed Sep 07, 2005 6:07 pm

Just google "The Metropolitan Police is" and see that this, at least, is widely used. In fact the Met itself is one of the sources, as is the BBC.

Yes, the word "Force" is understood and no, it's not the same as "The police has arrived" but it shows the dangers of generalisation, something which is always unwise :wink: .

It's always struck me that these unmarked plurals put together make for strange company:cattle, clergy, police, people and vermin . Or in some cases maybe not.

LarryLatham
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Post by LarryLatham » Wed Sep 07, 2005 7:11 pm

JTT wrote:It's always struck me that these unmarked plurals put together make for strange company:cattle, clergy, police, people and vermin . Or in some cases maybe not.
What a lovely--and brilliantly revealing, perhaps--observation! You have my admiration, Mr. JTT.

Larry Latham

Stephen Jones
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Post by Stephen Jones » Thu Sep 08, 2005 4:39 am

'Police' can take a plural or singular verb depending on whether you are thinking of a collection of individuals or a monolithic institution.

The plural form is much more common (at least three times so) but the singular form gets nearly 2 million hits in Google (over half of which appear to be genuine collocations).

The singular form is more common in British English, but is not unknown in American English, as can be seen from this example:
The Kentucky State Police is organized pursuant to KRS 16.040 and KRS 16.060.
www.kentuckystatepolice.org

LarryLatham
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Post by LarryLatham » Thu Sep 08, 2005 6:41 am

If you mention a particular police department, a following singular copula is pretty common:

The San Diego Police is looking into the discovery this morning of a body found in the trunk of a Mercedes parked at the airport.

Larry Latham

JuanTwoThree
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Post by JuanTwoThree » Thu Sep 08, 2005 7:58 am

Yup, as I say, when you hear in your mind's eye :lol: "(Force)" or something similar the singular seems ok

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