Teacher Discussion Forums

Portugal play well.

France are winning.

Elaboration?

Not this again.

A team can be thought of as a single entity or a group of individuals.

Both are correct.

Andrew Patterson wrote:Not this again.

A team can be thought of as a single entity or a group of individuals.

Both are correct.

Unless you are American, and then they sound weird. *shrug*

If Drog intended it?
Was Drog a Brit or Yank?

I thought Drog spoke King James anyhoo.
NO mention of Portugal, France or footie in the 1611 version, or any other come to thinks.

For me, play and plays seem pretty much interchangeable for the reason Andrew gives. However, Portugal cheat/dive/whinge to the ref every time he finds in favour of the opposition, no matter how blatant the foul or obvious the dive all sound wrong if you add -s to the verb. Maybe that's because we see cheating, diving and whinging as done by individuals, or groups of individuals rather than the team as a whole.

A team can be thought of as a single entity or a group of individuals.

So can food! The food are good. The beans, rice and beer! The food are good!

Maybe that's because we see cheating, diving and whinging as done by individuals, or groups of individuals rather than the team as a whole.

What is this "we" sh*t??? England cheats!!! Not just Crouch, or Terry and Beckham, but every last one of them! It's their culture!

There may be constructions that force a plural verb if you consider things that can only be done by individuals, for instance:

"The committee take their seats..."

The trouble here is that you could just as easily say, "The committee sit down..."

We can also talk of "committee members" if we want to refer to individuals.

Can anyone think of a similar construction that absolutely forces the use of a plural verb?

Hah. You know, if I hadn't been exposed to British English, I would have just marked those all wrong. Now I tell my students it is correct
English, but not used in the U.S.

"The food are good." Uh! No, this is wrong, "food" is uncountable.

Ok, let me see if I got this straight:

Portugal is countable, but food is not.

Right!


A team can be thought of as a single entity or a group of individuals, but food cannot.

Right!

Andrew Patterson wrote:"The food are good." Uh! No, this is wrong, "food" is uncountable.

Food is not always uncountable.

When we use type/kinds of, 'The foods of the world', for example.


But uncountable nouns are another subject.

Portugal and Committee are both entities as well as being (or having the potential to be) proper nouns.

* "Class! Behave yourself!" *


So addressing a singular entity it seems better to use a plural reflexive pronoun.

What's the AmE view?

Juan wrote:

Class! Behave yourself!"
So addressing a singular entity it seems better to use a plural verb.

That's an imperative and so the infinitive.

You're right and I've deviously edited my original post. It was early.

Looks like verbs choose form over meaning in agreement business. Since pronouns are essentially about person and number, they go by meaning.