The Grammar Logs
#561

Hi, I need to know when putting in an editor's note, what is the correct form? For example, would it be [Ed. Note: Blah, blah.] or would it be [ed. note: Blah, blah.]?

Thank you very much for your help!

The Chicago Manual of Style recommends that you write your note as if it were just regular note, and then put Ed. at the end of your note and italicize it. Another way of doing this is to create all of your editor's notes using a symbol (asterisk or whatever) for your editor's notes and numbers for your non-editor's notes, and put your editor's notes above any other kind of note. Consistency is a virtue. If you're doing a lot of work like this, you ought to get hold of a copy of the Chicago Manual.

The Gregorian calendar is popular in much of the world.

In the preceeding sentence are there two prepositional phrases ("in much" followed by "of the world")? I cannot see how "much" could be the object of the preposition "in."

Or is there just one prepositional phrase ("in much of the world," with "in" as the preposition, "the world" as the object of the preposition, and "much of" acting as some kind of modifier)?

Yes, there are two prepositional phrases there: "in much" and "of the world." And yes, it seems odd to think of "much" as a noun, but that's what it is in that sentence. It would also be a noun in a sentence like "He doesn't like much" and "We can't give away much to our enemies." So in your sentence, "much" is, indeed, the object of the preposition "in" and "of the world" is a prepositional phrase modifying "much."

Is it correct to say either or just the first:

• between 52nd and 53rd streets
or

• between 52nd and 53rd street

Just use the first version — and "between 10th and 11th avenues," for instance.

In the sentence,

Stop biting your nails, please.

what is the function of the word biting?

Is it a gerund? part of the verb? I'm not sure!

"Biting your nails" is the object of what the understood subject, "you," is being asked to stop. It's a gerund phrase, with "biting" being the gerund (verb form used as a noun) itself.

When you write "Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA)" should it be followed by the verb "is" or "are," It seems that it should take the singular "is" but I have seen it both ways. Thank you.

You may have seen it both ways, but "earnings" is a plural noun, always, and it needs a plural "are." (This is true regardless of what comes between the subject and the verb — in this case a rather extensive prepositional phrase.)

Hi! I was just reading a copy of Fudge-A-Mania by Judy Blume to my class and when we read the summary on the back of the book, we came across a possible grammatical error.

The paragraph reads:

Peter's parents have decided to rent a summer house next door to the Tubman's. Which means Peter will be stuck with Fudge and Sheila the Cootie Queen for three whole weeks!

We believe that the second sentence is incorrect, being that it begins with the word "which."

Please let us know what you think!

The word which is often used in just this manner, a summative stylistic device, usually appearing at the head of what is indeed a sentence fragment, but one that sums up a previous sentence or even a whole series of sentences. For instance, you might tell us a long and elaborate tale about a monkey's prehensile tail, and end all those sentences by saying, "Which is how the monkey came to have such a long and useful tail!" This usage is regarded as acceptable, even in the most formal prose. Your students are subtle readers; it's scary.

Hi. I work at the paper, and something came up last night that has me stumped. Could you set me straight, please?

It concerns the following sentence:

"Banks have been reopening all over Baghdad after having barricaded their premises shut."

My confusion is over the phrase "having barricaded."

Is this correct, or would it have been better to go with something like the following?

"Banks have been reopening all over Baghdad after barricading their premises shut."

Or are both OK?

Your instincts are serving you well here. The "after having barricaded" is clumsy, to say the least. If we switch the order of things, it becomes even clearer how your rewrite helps:

After barricading their premises shut, banks have been reopening all over Baghdad.

And if we add a time element, "After barricading their premises shut for over a month, the banks in Baghdad have been reopening lately," it sounds even better.

I retrieved this paragraph from the CNN website.

"......The visit followed a formula the president has developed in the period following the war and the run-up to his re-election campaign: He uses a defense contractor as the setting for a speech that bridges the seemingly disparate themes of the economy and national security. "

It used "followed" and "is" in the sentences. Did it violate the tense consistency rule?

The past tense of "followed" is used because it's reporting a historical event, something that happened in the past. The "uses" is used because it's reporting a habitual pattern of behavior, something that goes on now, in the present, something that the President does. You can switch tenses in this manner when logic calls for it.

Of the hundreds of poems read and discussed, only a fraction was chosen for publication

In the above sentence, should it be fraction was or fraction were?

Thanks!

Here, " a fraction" refers to a notionally plural thing (it's still a whole bunch of poems), so use the plural "were chosen."

This is our example:

Here is our new house.

What is the subject of the verb "is"? Is house the subject, or is here the subject. (I believe that house is the subject. My daughter's first grade teacher says "here" is the subject.) If house is the subject, what would part of speech is "here"? And of course, if here is the subject, then what is house? I do have to say that I have searched all afternoon for this answer and I obviously need to get a life! I will get a life right after you answer this question for me.

Thank you.

You probably won't make any friends with your daugher's teacher if you teach your daughter to say "cataphoric reference." "Here," in that sentence, is an adverb (as you correctly surmise, but it can also be called a "place adjunct") with cataphoric reference; that is, it refers us to something that is about to follow: in this case, the new house. It works, actually, in the same manner as the demonstrative pronoun with cataphoric reference: "This is our new house." The difference is that "this," as demonstrative pronoun, can act as subject, but "here," as an adverb, cannot. Another argument you might use is that "here" cannot determine the number of the verb that follows (so how can it be the subject?). For instance, we say "here is the house" but "here are the students." So, with all due respect, your daughter's instructor might be wrong on this one, but you still have to get a life.

Authority: The Oxford English Grammar by Sidney Greenbaum. Oxford University Press. New York: 1996.

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