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by maxi_infy » Sat Feb 14, 2009 7:07 am
please help me with this;

The increased popularity and availability of televisions has led to the decline of
regional dialects, language variations which originate from diverse ethnic and
cultural heritages and perpetuated by geographic isolation.

(A) which originate from diverse ethnic and cultural heritages and perpetuated
(B) that originated from diverse ethnic and cultural heritages and perpetuated
(C) originated from diverse ethnic and cultural heritages and perpetuated
(D) originating from diverse ethnic and cultural heritages and perpetuated
(E) originating from diverse ethnic and cultural heritages and perpetuating

Just saw this question in a model test and am not satisfied with this OA.
OA is D

I chose 'C'.
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by Karen » Sat Feb 14, 2009 7:53 am
The increased popularity and availability of televisions has led to the decline of
regional dialects, language variations which originate from diverse ethnic and
cultural heritages and perpetuated by geographic isolation.

(A) which originate from diverse ethnic and cultural heritages and perpetuated
(B) that originated from diverse ethnic and cultural heritages and perpetuated
(C) originated from diverse ethnic and cultural heritages and perpetuated
(D) originating from diverse ethnic and cultural heritages and perpetuated
(E) originating from diverse ethnic and cultural heritages and perpetuating

It can't be C because the only way that "originated" could be grammatical here would be if it were a passive participle; otherwise it needs a word like 'that' or 'which' in front of it. But it can't be a passive participle because "originate" is an intransitive verb and so it can't have a passive form.

The correct choice is D, in which the present participle "originating" is parallel to the passive participle "perpetuated." If anyone wants more explanation of how that works, please ask.
Karen van Hoek, PhD
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by dendude » Sat Feb 14, 2009 8:05 am
What is wrong with B?
Probably if it was,
that originated from diverse ethnic and cultural heritages and were perpetuated
it could have been correct

Just asking.
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by Karen » Sat Feb 14, 2009 11:27 am
Yes, B would've been OK if it had said "were perpetuated."
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by Uri » Sun Feb 15, 2009 2:30 am
Karen wrote:The increased popularity and availability of televisions has led to the decline of regional dialects, language variations which originate from diverse ethnic and cultural heritages and perpetuated by geographic isolation.

(A) which originate from diverse ethnic and cultural heritages and perpetuated
(B) that originated from diverse ethnic and cultural heritages and perpetuated
(C) originated from diverse ethnic and cultural heritages and perpetuated
(D) originating from diverse ethnic and cultural heritages and perpetuated
(E) originating from diverse ethnic and cultural heritages and perpetuating

It can't be C because the only way that "originated" could be grammatical here would be if it were a passive participle; otherwise it needs a word like 'that' or 'which' in front of it. But it can't be a passive participle because "originate" is an intransitive verb and so it can't have a passive form.

The correct choice is D, in which the present participle "originating" is parallel to the passive participle "perpetuated." If anyone wants more explanation of how that works, please ask.
Karen, could you please explain the above concept with another example? I could not understand why "originated" and "perpetuated" are not parallel. I am not a native English speaker and the fine points of grammar are not very clear to me. Is not "perpetuate" an intransitive verb too? It would be very helpful if you can explain in short how we can identify an intransitive verb.
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by Karen » Sun Feb 15, 2009 7:17 am
Well, I wish I could give you a good way to identify an intransitive verb, but unfortunately it mostly comes down to memory. If you can think of a phrase in which the verb can take an object -- as in "Some politicians are perpetuating the myth that the stimulus bill includes funding to save a mouse" -- then you know it's transitive. "Perpetuate" cannot be used in an intransitive way, in fact -- you can't say "This thing perpetuates" to mean it continues. It has to be transitive. Conversely, I don't think "originate" can be used transitively, and in this case it's definitely not transitive.

The reason "originated" and "perpetuated" aren't parallel here is that "originated" is a past tense verb, and "perpetuated" is a passive participle. It's like saying this:

War and Peace is a novel written by Tolstoi and contained almost 1,000 pages.


"written" is a passive participle and "contained" is a past tense verb.
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by Uri » Sun Feb 15, 2009 10:12 am
thank you, Karen! nice examples have made things clearer :)
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