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Pronoun singular/plural

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by mparakala » Sun Feb 03, 2013 12:35 pm
Unique among the Romance languages, Portuguese features days that are not named but numbered, evidence of their strong mercantile heritage.

A) features days that are not named but numbered, evidence of their strong mercantile heritage

B) features days that are not named but numbered, evidence of its strong mercantile heritage

C) has numbered rather than named its days, evidence of its strong mercantile heritage

D) numbered rather than named its days, out of its strong mercantile heritage

E) features days that are not named but numbered, evidence of the strong Portuguese mercantile heritage

OA from veritas: E

I chose C as I believed that "its" is a singular pronoun form that is not ambiguous and refers to Portugese. I found E to be wordy. How can this be the right one?

Kindly explain. Thanks!
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by Lifetron » Sun Feb 03, 2013 10:47 pm
C and D are wrong coz Portuguese[Language] didn't number itself. It jus features.

"their strong mercantile heritage", here "their" refers to Portuguese[people]. I don't think a language can have a mercantile heritage. I think here it refers to the "mercantile heritage" of Portuguese[people]. "its" is therefore wrong. B is wrong.

In A "their" has an ambiguous subject. However, in E it is clearly stated. 1st Portuguese is clearly stated as a language. 2nd Portuguese as people.
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by Tommy Wallach » Mon Feb 04, 2013 11:51 am
Hey All,

Good explanations from Gughan. Just to go one by one.
Unique among the Romance languages, Portuguese features days that are not named but numbered, evidence of their strong mercantile heritage.
A) features days that are not named but numbered, evidence of their strong mercantile heritage
Who is the "their"? It's the Portuguese people, but they need to have been mentioned in the sentence if they want to be referred to by this pronoun!
B) features days that are not named but numbered, evidence of its strong mercantile heritage
"Its" refers to Portuguese. But the language doesn't have a mercantile heritage. That doesn't make any sense!
C) has numbered rather than named its days, evidence of its strong mercantile heritage
Portuguese did not do this action itself. Also, the language doesn't have a strong mercantile heritage!
D) numbered rather than named its days, out of its strong mercantile heritage
Portuguese did not do this action itself. Again, the language doesn't have a strong mercantile language. Also, the prepositional modifier "out of its" is weirdly placed, so vague.
E) features days that are not named but numbered, evidence of the strong Portuguese mercantile heritage
Perfect!

-t
Tommy Wallach, Company Expert
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by jainpiyushjain » Thu Mar 07, 2013 9:50 pm
I was unable to find the main verb in the sentence. Can you please help ?

Thank you
Tommy Wallach wrote:Hey All,

Good explanations from Gughan. Just to go one by one.
Unique among the Romance languages, Portuguese features days that are not named but numbered, evidence of their strong mercantile heritage.
A) features days that are not named but numbered, evidence of their strong mercantile heritage
Who is the "their"? It's the Portuguese people, but they need to have been mentioned in the sentence if they want to be referred to by this pronoun!
B) features days that are not named but numbered, evidence of its strong mercantile heritage
"Its" refers to Portuguese. But the language doesn't have a mercantile heritage. That doesn't make any sense!
C) has numbered rather than named its days, evidence of its strong mercantile heritage
Portuguese did not do this action itself. Also, the language doesn't have a strong mercantile heritage!
D) numbered rather than named its days, out of its strong mercantile heritage
Portuguese did not do this action itself. Again, the language doesn't have a strong mercantile language. Also, the prepositional modifier "out of its" is weirdly placed, so vague.
E) features days that are not named but numbered, evidence of the strong Portuguese mercantile heritage
Perfect!

-t
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