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Manhattan SC: Subject Verb Agreement Q15

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Manhattan SC: Subject Verb Agreement Q15

by bsandhyav » Wed Oct 29, 2008 9:51 am
Hi

The following statement in Manhattan SC seems very obviously wrong to me. Yet Manhattan SC states it to be correct. Can anybody pls expalin how?

A majority of railway commuters reads or listens to music while travelling. -Correct

According to me the right answer should be:
A majority of railway commuters read or listen to music while travelling.

My reasoning behind this is : Not only does it sound right but also a majority of railway commuters refers to a part of the whole, so it should be accompanied by a plural verb.


Please tell me if my line of thinking is right or wrong and why!!!
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Re: Manhattan SC: Subject Verb Agreement Q15

by logitech » Wed Oct 29, 2008 10:20 am
bsandhyav wrote:Hi

My reasoning behind this is : Not only does it sound right but also a majority of railway commuters refers to a part of the whole, so it should be accompanied by a plural verb.
You said it! ;-) It is A part of whole, which acts like "singular" subject

Also note that it is A MAJORITY not MAJORITY
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by Bidisha800 » Wed Oct 29, 2008 7:09 pm
Buy/Borrow a good grammar book and read the chapter on collective nouns. :twisted: :twisted:
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Re: Manhattan SC: Subject Verb Agreement Q15

by bsandhyav » Wed Oct 29, 2008 8:08 pm
logitech wrote:
bsandhyav wrote:Hi

My reasoning behind this is : Not only does it sound right but also a majority of railway commuters refers to a part of the whole, so it should be accompanied by a plural verb.
You said it! ;-) It is A part of whole, which acts like "singular" subject

Also note that it is A MAJORITY not MAJORITY


Manhattan SC says that when u are referring to the entire majority-majority is treated as singular; when you are referring to the majorities individual components(part of the whole) it is treated as plural.

Here we are talking about a majority of railway commuters so it sounds like talking about many individual railway commuters.


Yeah the logic A team plays
A majority reads sounds perfectly right to me
But when it comes to A majority of railway commuters i feel like we are talking about the individual components of majority and should be plural

Please let me knw whr i am going wrong!!!
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Re: Manhattan SC: Subject Verb Agreement Q15

by rohangupta83 » Thu Oct 30, 2008 4:32 am
bsandhyav wrote: But when it comes to A majority of railway commuters i feel like we are talking about the individual components of majority and should be plural

Please let me knw whr i am going wrong!!!
you are right ! :D

for the sentence to use the singular verb 'reads' and a singular verb 'listens' the sentence should look something like this:

The railway commuters majority either reads (beaththegmat posts) or listens to music..........

Note: I did add a few things to make the sentence parallel and idiomatic.
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Re: Manhattan SC: Subject Verb Agreement Q15

by rohangupta83 » Thu Oct 30, 2008 4:44 am
bsandhyav wrote:Hi

The following statement in Manhattan SC seems very obviously wrong to me. Yet Manhattan SC states it to be correct. Can anybody pls expalin how?

A majority of railway commuters reads or listens to music while travelling. -Correct
I am also using manhattan SC, could you tell me where did you read this statement?
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by bsandhyav » Thu Oct 30, 2008 7:47 am
Manhatta SC page 23
Topic : Numerical Words and Phrases
Line number : 8
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Re: Manhattan SC: Subject Verb Agreement Q15

by bsandhyav » Thu Oct 30, 2008 7:52 am
rohangupta83 wrote:
bsandhyav wrote: But when it comes to A majority of railway commuters i feel like we are talking about the individual components of majority and should be plural

Please let me knw whr i am going wrong!!!
you are right ! :D

for the sentence to use the singular verb 'reads' and a singular verb 'listens' the sentence should look something like this:

The railway commuters majority either reads (beaththegmat posts) or listens to music..........

Note: I did add a few things to make the sentence parallel and idiomatic.
Thanks a lot Rohan....i just re-read the statement in Manhattan SC to give u the exact location and caught the flaw in my line of thinking!!! Its the A majority and The majority that makes all the difference in singular and plural!!!
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by niraj_a » Thu Oct 30, 2008 8:44 am
i think it also has to do with the nouns that come after
majority i.e. if the noun is countable or non-countable
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by prepfortests » Sun Mar 08, 2009 11:39 pm
Which edition of the Manhattan GMAT did you find this question in?

I ask because I wrote a very similar question for PrepForTests in 2006.
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by goelmohit2002 » Mon Mar 09, 2009 4:42 am
Hi All,

There is a one more parallel thread going in for the same question: :-)

https://www.beatthegmat.com/manhattan-bo ... tml#131166

Kindly go through the link once.

Manhattan SC guide says "reads or listens" but Manhattan Instructor says "Read or listen"

I am also totally confused in this.

Experts please help.

Thanks
Mohit
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