THE RULES OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE CONCORD
Introduction
In the study of the English language and any other language, concord simply refers to the
agreement existing between the various parts of the sentence. According to Baker (2003, p.44)
concord is the agreement in gender, case number or person between different words that share
reference in a sentence. A sentence traditionally is divided into a subject and a predicate; where
the subject is the performer of the action and the predicate refers to the verb and the other
elements that come after it. In this chapter, we are going to consider mainly the agreement
between a subject and the predicate in the sentence. In the sentence, the subject is the performer
of the action or what is being talked about; the action is the predicate in its simplest terms. The
two parts (subject and predicate) need to agree for a grammatically correct sentence.
For example:
The teacher /is teaching.
Subject predicate
The student/ is learning
Subject predicate
As you can see above, the teacher and the student are the ones performing the actions of teaching
and learning that is why they are the subjects and the action is the predicate in the sentences.
Now that we understand what a subject and a predicate are, let us now focus on their agreement.
The simple rule in the English language on how agreement is reached between a subject and
, a predicate is: a singular subject takes a singular predicate and a plural subject takes a plural
predicate. A simple demonstration of these rules can be seen in sentences such as:
The boy is here
The boys are here
The boy likes to work
The boys like to work
When the subject boy is singular, the action (predicate) shown by is and likes are also singular;
when it is boys, the plural forms of are and like are used.
N.B: when a verb takes the s-form as in likes, speaks, eats, sleeps etc, they are for singular
third person. Examples:
He sleeps a lot. Mary sleeps too much.
I sleep a lot. We sleep a lot. They sleep a lot.
Now, let us focus on the other rules that govern the subject verb agreement in a sentence. These
other rules are more of exceptions to the general rule stated above. This is because the rules that
follow are not in conformity to the above rule. And these are the more complex rules.
Rule 1:
When any other conjunction apart from ‘and’ is used to link two subjects, the verb agrees with
the first subject of the sentence. Examples of these conjunctions are: together with, as well as,
along with, no less than, including, not mention, in collaboration with etc. When a sentence is
Introduction
In the study of the English language and any other language, concord simply refers to the
agreement existing between the various parts of the sentence. According to Baker (2003, p.44)
concord is the agreement in gender, case number or person between different words that share
reference in a sentence. A sentence traditionally is divided into a subject and a predicate; where
the subject is the performer of the action and the predicate refers to the verb and the other
elements that come after it. In this chapter, we are going to consider mainly the agreement
between a subject and the predicate in the sentence. In the sentence, the subject is the performer
of the action or what is being talked about; the action is the predicate in its simplest terms. The
two parts (subject and predicate) need to agree for a grammatically correct sentence.
For example:
The teacher /is teaching.
Subject predicate
The student/ is learning
Subject predicate
As you can see above, the teacher and the student are the ones performing the actions of teaching
and learning that is why they are the subjects and the action is the predicate in the sentences.
Now that we understand what a subject and a predicate are, let us now focus on their agreement.
The simple rule in the English language on how agreement is reached between a subject and
, a predicate is: a singular subject takes a singular predicate and a plural subject takes a plural
predicate. A simple demonstration of these rules can be seen in sentences such as:
The boy is here
The boys are here
The boy likes to work
The boys like to work
When the subject boy is singular, the action (predicate) shown by is and likes are also singular;
when it is boys, the plural forms of are and like are used.
N.B: when a verb takes the s-form as in likes, speaks, eats, sleeps etc, they are for singular
third person. Examples:
He sleeps a lot. Mary sleeps too much.
I sleep a lot. We sleep a lot. They sleep a lot.
Now, let us focus on the other rules that govern the subject verb agreement in a sentence. These
other rules are more of exceptions to the general rule stated above. This is because the rules that
follow are not in conformity to the above rule. And these are the more complex rules.
Rule 1:
When any other conjunction apart from ‘and’ is used to link two subjects, the verb agrees with
the first subject of the sentence. Examples of these conjunctions are: together with, as well as,
along with, no less than, including, not mention, in collaboration with etc. When a sentence is
