Ask the English Teacher

Next or Nothing?

Hermaine asks:
My friend and I have an ON-GOING discussion, and sometimes, "heated" discussion about the word "next" when used with reference to a day. Today is Tuesday, February 21st -- we have a commitment on Sunday, February 26th. If we are talking about that Sunday, do we refer to it as Sunday or [next]
Sunday?

My thought is that there is no other Sunday between today and Sunday, 2/26, so we should refer to it as just plain "Sunday". If I said "NEXT" Sunday, today, I would be referring to Sunday, 3/6! Am I correct?

I could go either way on this one: "I'm going to the movies Sunday," or "I'm going to the movies next Sunday." If I wanted to specify March 6, I'd say "I'm going to the movies on the Sunday after next."

However, I would be more likely to say "next Sunday" on Tuesday and plain "Sunday" on Friday night. Somewhere between Tuesday and Friday, the "next" becomes unnecessary. I have no idea why this should be!

Are or Is?

Susan asks a fascinating question:
I am currently going to an adult school, where you more or less teach yourself. I just recently completed an exam on grammar and was marked wrong for the following question:

"Are either of you going to the dance?"

I said the subject and verb do not agree because when either is used as a subject it always takes a singular verb. Also, if you type this sentence in Microsoft word and do a spell and grammar check it also tells you the grammar is incorrect.

The facility where I am attending school gave me this response and I quote:

"After much thinking on our end, we've come up with an explanation. Are is the 2nd person singular of "to be" as well as the third person plural.

So:
I am
You are
He is
She is
They are

In this sentence, through the use of the words "you" and "either" the reader is informed that the sentence is directed towards an immediate, collective group. However, the sentence could also be rephrased as:

Are either you or you going to the dance? In this instance, both uses of you are singular. So, in the sentence shown, you is actually the singular conjunction of the verb. Susan is correct in her use of grammar, but neglected the 2nd person use of "you" which would require "are" in singular form."

I think they are wrong and that I am right. Please let me know what you think

I think they're right. But it's a complex issue!

When we use "either" and "neither," we're saying that one or the other of the following nouns or pronouns is the subject, but not both. So we can say "Either Susan or Crawford IS right." "Neither Crawford nor Susan IS going to the dance."

But we can certainly use a plural verb if the choices are plural: "Either the Smiths or the Robinsons ARE going to to the dance."

What's more, if we have one singular and one plural noun or pronoun, the verb will agree with the closer of the two: "Either Susan or the teachers ARE right." "Either the teachers or Susan IS right."

In the case of the sentence "Are either of you going to the dance?", it's inverted (verb before subject) because it's a question. But if we turn it into a declarative sentence, it's going to be something like "Either you or you ARE going to the dance."

So for slightly different reasons, I agree with your teachers. But you are certainly keeping them on their toes!

Pertinent? Relevant?

Bob asks:
Is there a proper context for using "pertinent" versus "relevant"? What would the proper context be for each?

A good question I hadn't thought of before. My dictionary tells me they're synonymous: both mean "related to or bearing upon the matter in hand." If your question is relevant to this blog, then it's also pertinent to it.

But the negatives of these words have rather different meanings!

If something is irrelevant, it's not related to the matter in hand. If you're asking about English usage, and I talk about the weather here in Vancouver, I'm being irrelevant.

But if you ask about English usage, and I say: "Don't bother me with your questions!" —then I'm being impertinent, which means rude or insolent, deliberately disrespectful. "Impertinent" does have a secondary meaning of "irrelevant," but I've never heard or read it used that way.

Due to or Because of?

Deepika writes:
I have a question. Can I use because of instead of due to in the sentence mentioned here?
How are due to and because of different?

However, the running data on the active board cannot be sent to the standby board in time due to sudden unplug of it, so serious consequences such as service interruption, loss of bills and supplementary service data, or office data may take place.

"Due to" and "Because of" mean about the same thing. But we generally use "because of" before a phrase with a verb, and "due to" before a phrase with a noun:

We were late because of slow-moving traffic. ("moving" is a verb)
We were late due to heavy traffic. ("traffic" is a noun)

In the example you give, Deepika, I would rewrite the sentence. "Unplug of it" is not acceptable English, and the second clause could be clearer:

However, the running data cannot be sent to the standby board in time
because of sudden unplugging OR
due to its sudden disconnection

so serious consequences may occur, such as service interruption and loss of bills, supplementary service data, or office data.

Note that we use "take place" for an intentional event caused by human beings: The wedding took place on Saturday afternoon. The conference took place in a big hotel. "Occurred" means an event caused by natural forces or by human accident: The earthquake occurred at midnight. The collision occurred during rush hour.

Also note that the second clause should be parallel. That is, we are listing "consequences" in two groups: service interruption and loss. The second group includes three kinds of loss: bills, supplementary service data, and office data. So we need "and" between service interruption and loss, and then an "or" before the last item in the list (office data).

Thanks for an interesting question!

Almost a Million English Words

This isn't an answer to anyone's question, but today's Globe and Mail, our Canadian national newspaper, has an article that you will probably enjoy: Spreading the (English) word.

It's about the spread of English around the world, and the rapid growth in the number of English words. I thought the language had about 600,000 words...it's a lot more!

In glasses or With glasses?

Peggy asks:
Which sentence is correct?

I like the girl in glasses.
I like the girl with glasses.

"In glasses" would be preferable. That's because the girl is wearing glasses—she is literally "in" glasses. For the same reason, we would say:

I like the girl in the red dress.
I like the girl in the cowboy hat.

We would use "with" when something is associated with the person:

I like the girl with the briefcase.
I like the girl with the iPod.
I like the girl with the dog.

Spaces between paragraphs

Lindsay asks:
Do you space between paragraphs in a friendly letter?

Yes, because friends make life easier for one another! A space between paragraphs gives the reader a rest from a solid block of text.

This is especially true if the letter is an email. Poor screen resolution slows down our reading speed by up to 25 percent. If we're looking at a screen full of text, we slow down even more—or else we just don't read it at all.

When I'm teaching email business correspondence, I tell my students to keep most sentences to 20 words, and most paragraphs to just three or four sentences. That makes the text much more readable.