05/2014 - The Grammar-Us Blog - Grammar-Us

Due to the Memorial Day holiday and subsequent shorter work week, I decided not to dedicate this week’s blog to a specific grammar or effective writing topic.  Instead, I thought I’d share some of the grammar gaffs that I have encountered recently.  Many of these were heard on television and radio – a scary scenario, given the number of people who were exposed to them!  A few were in writing, and a couple of them were from overheard conversations.  

I will list them below “as is,” giving you the opportunity to test yourself and see if you can spot the error.  SPOILER ALERT:  I will give you the answers at the end of this post, so don’t scroll to the bottom until you’re ready to have the answers revealed!

1. “The roads were lined with graveside cemeteries.”
2. “One out of ten women have felt badly about their bodies.”
3. “They kept throwing themselves into untenuous situations.”
4. “They issued him with an entry visa.”
5. “The longer the time goes by, the less chance we have to find them.”
6. “One out of ten students die before graduation.”
7. “I guess moms do knows best.”
8. “Leads come in, but none of them are solid.”
9. “Shareholders approved a 35% pay increase. That’s up from the year before.”
10. “There’s a good deal of sunshine basking down on us today.”
11. “The last of the rescue ships arrive offshore.”
12. “Happy belated birthday to Kim Hendron.”

ANSWERS:

1. “The roads were lined with graveside cemeteries.”  I believe this sentence should read, “The roads were lined with cemeteries.”  Since cemeteries contain graves, “graveside cemeteries” is redundant at best and nonsensical at worst!  

2. “One out of ten women have felt badly about their bodies.”  There are actually three errors in this sentence.  

First, the word “badly” should be “bad.”  This is because, whenever using one of the “sense” verbs (feel, taste, look or smell) in a descriptive manner rather than an active manner, an adjective is the proper descriptor, not an adverb.  In the above sentence, the women are not feeling with their fingers (which would be the act of feeling); instead, their state of mind is being described.  Therefore, the adjective “bad” is correct.

The second error is one of subject and verb agreement.  “One” is the subject of this sentence, and obviously, it is singular. Therefore, the verb should be singular also (“has”).  

Third, the writer has used the word “their.”  “Their” is a plural word.  Since the subject of this sentence is singular (one woman), “her” would have been the correct word to use.

Bottom line:  The correct sentence would be: “One out of ten women has felt bad about her body.”


3. “They kept throwing themselves into untenuous situations.” The problem with this sentence is usage of the non-word “untenuous.”  The word “tenuous” means “very weak or slight, doubtful or dubious.”  This is not a word to which one can attach the “un” prefix, but if it was possible, then the speaker would have been saying that the situation was not weak or slight.  I believe the writer meant to say the situations were untenable, which would mean that they were not able to be maintained or defended.

4. “They issued him with an entry visa.”  “They” – whoever “they” are – did not issue the person (“him”).  They issued the visa.  It’s that pesky little preposition, “with” that makes this sentence incorrect.  The correct sentence should read, “They issued him an entry visa.” Alternatively, the sentence may be written as follows: “They issued an entry visa to him.”


5. “The longer the time goes by, the less chance we have to find them.”  Time does not go by longer.  The correct sentence would be, “The more time goes by, the less chance we have to find them.”

6. “One out of ten students die before graduation.” This is another sentence in which the subject and verb do not agree.  “One” is the subject of this sentence, not “students.”  Therefore, the correct sentence would be, “One out of ten students dies before graduation.”  

7. “I guess moms do knows best.”  This is another tragic case of singular and plural mix-ups!  The correct sentence should be, “I guess moms do know best.”

8. “Leads come in, but none of them are solid.”  There certainly was a lot of disagreement between subjects and verbs in the errors I discovered this week!  As I explained in a previous post, the word “none” is singular. (It means “no one” or “not one”).  This sentence should have read, “Leads come in, but none of them is solid.”

9. “Shareholders approved a 35% pay increase. That’s up from the year before.”  I threw this one in as a bit of a trick!  There is nothing grammatically wrong with either of the two sentences.  However, the second sentence is redundant.  If the pay increased, then does it not stand to reason that that’s up? Obviously, the speaker wanted to clarify that the increase was from last year.  He could have done that in the first sentence.  Thus, had I been writing this, I would have said, “Shareholders approved a 35% pay increase over last year.”

10. “There’s a good deal of sunshine basking down on us today.” “Basking” means to lie exposed to warmth and light.  The sunshine is not being exposed to warmth and light; it is warmth and light. I would have said, “There is a good deal of sunshine beaming down on us today.”

11. “The last of the rescue ships arrive offshore.”  Yet another case of singular and plural disagreement.  (Note to self: Dedicate a blog post to this oh-so-common error!)  The correct sentence should be, “The last of the rescue ships arrives offshore.”

12. “Happy belated birthday to Kim Hendron.”  I see and hear this one all the time!  It is not the birthday that is belated, it is the birthday greeting.  Therefore, the correct sentence would be, “Belated Happy Birthday to Kim Hendron.”

How did you do?  I hope you found most of these grammar gaffs easy to spot, and that you had fun uncovering them.