SUBJECT – VERB AGREEMENT PART - I

SUBJECT – VERB AGREEMENT PART - I

In academic writing, Subject - Verb agreement plays a cardinal importance. Subject-Verb agreement is one of the topics where most of the writers do not want to go wrong, as mistakes in sentence structure reduce the credibility in writing. To put it in a nutshell, Subject and Verb should agree with each other to make the agreement appealing. The Following table displays the basic rule in Subject-Verb agreement.

I	You	He	She	It	We	They
am	are	is			are	are

 

Person	Do	Does
First Person	I We	-
Second Person	You	-
Third Person	They	He / she / It

A few problems with Subject-Verb agreement in the formation of sentence structure are mentioned below.

1.     a. Singular subject takes singular verb

      eg: Dora is looking like a doll

b.     Plural subject takes plural verb

      eg: Dolls are looking like Dora.

c.     You are looking like Dora

      (Exception: The singular subject ‘YOU’ is always followed by plural verb)

2.    In Third person singular – singular subject takes singular verb (with‘s’/ ‘es’) and plural subject takes plural verb (with no‘s’/ ‘es’).

      eg: He goes to temple daily

            They go to temple daily

3.    The verb should agree only with the main subject not with the intervening plural.

           eg: The garden with flowers is beautiful

(Here, the main subject is ‘The garden’ not the flowers)

4.     Subjects joined by ‘and’ always take the plural verb.

     eg: Ram and Raju are  playing in the garden

     Exception:

1.     Our secretary and treasurer is Francis Louis. ( Two singular nouns denoting the same person)

2.     Every man and woman in the city is punished. ( If two subject connected by ‘and’ is preceded by ‘each, every and ‘many’, then it takes singular verb)

 

Author:

Dr. L. Suresh

Assistant Professor of English

Sri Ramakrishna Mission Vidyalaya College of Arts and Science (Autonomous)

Coimbatore – 641 020