<p>Hoping someone who is familiar with the SAT Writing Section can help me out with a question about collective nouns and how it is applied actually on the SAT Writing test.</p>
<p>Collective nouns -
On page 30 of Erica's book, she states that collective nouns ( jury) are tested frequently in regard to pronoun agreement, and because they are SINGULAR......</p>
<p>COLLECTIVE NOUNS ARE ALWAYS SINGULAR PER ERICA.</p>
<p>But..............Any good grammar book would tell you that </p>
<p>COLLECTIVE NOUNS ARE SINGULAR OR PLURAL DEPENDING UPON
whether the members of the group are acting as a single unit or are they acting as separate individuals.</p>
<p>If the group is acting as one ( singular entity) , then it is singular.</p>
<p>But, if the group is acting independently, or are seen as different from one another, it is plural.</p>
<p>MY QUESTION is ......</p>
<p>Has Erica Meltzer reviewed all SAT writing questions and concluded that the SAT only addresses collective nouns as Singular?</p>
<p>If so, this does fly a bit away from conventional grammar.</p>
<p>Although I don’t know anything about “Erica” or her book, in general I’d say she’s right.</p>
<p>I realize that you’d like a definitive answer, but instances in which a collective noun would be plural are quite rare and often if not usually stylistically awkward.</p>
<p>Can you give me an example of something that might contradict “her” rule? If so, I can tell you whether it’s proof that she’s right or wrong.</p>
<p>You asked whether this person has “reviewed all SAT writing questions and concluded that the SAT only addresses collective nouns as singular.”</p>
<p>ANSWER: I seriously doubt it.</p>
<p>This is a pretty esoteric question. If this is the biggest problem you’re having with grammar, then you don’t have much to worry about anyway.</p>
<p>Sorry, I wasn’t clear in my question.
She has reviewed ALL SAT writing questions
( she does a detailed analysis at the back of her book to justify her results.)</p>
<p>My question was only about this:
DOES THE SAT ONLY ADDRESSES COLLECTIVE NOUNS AS SINGULAR?
( that seems to be Erica’s rule…).</p>
<p>So, here is an example of a collective noun acting plural.</p>
<p>(An example that contradicts her rule as you requested)</p>
<p>My family always fight(s) over who should do the dinner dishes.</p>
<p>The answer here would be fight.</p>
<p>( They are acting as several individuals, not one cohesive unit)</p>
<p>The bigger issue for me is that I just opened up her book and am wondering if her rules are based on how the SAT interprets grammar.</p>
<p>Wow. I took the SAT about 25 years ago. I’m amazed that anyone has compiled data on anything (except maybe sports) going that far back…and the SAT has been around a lot longer than I have.</p>
<p>As for your example…here’s how it should look:</p>
<p>My family always fights over who should do the dinner dishes.</p>
<p>The good news is that the test makers go to great lengths to ensure that there’s no ambiguity with regard to what might be the correct answer.</p>
<p>I really appreciate your time, but your answer is wrong.
The answer is fight. </p>
<p>I wasn’t posting the the sentence as a question to be figured out. I was showing how it directly conflicts with Erica’s assertion about collective nouns being singular.</p>
<p>Also, I tried to edit my comment above but the software wouldn’t allow me to do so.</p>
<p>I said that there’s “no ambiguity with regard to what might be the correct answer.”</p>
<p>Obviously I misphrased that. What I meant to say is that although several answers might appear correct, there is only one correct answer to each question.</p>
<p>Um… no. The point was that this is is the complete opposite of what Erica is stating.
Erica’s book states that collective nouns are singular.
( I am even getting bored with writing the same thing over and over again).</p>
<p>Again, I appreciate your time, but I was looking for guidance with:
the SAT Writing section
Erica’s book
-and this particular rule . </p>
<p>I was just looking for someone to help out with this particular concept that has taken the SAT writing section. You state that you haven’t taken the SAT test in 25 years, so I would imagine you are not familiar with the writing section, and besides you view this as an “esoteric question”.</p>
<p>I don’t mean to be snarky and waste your time, my time or the poor readers who are looking at this. Perhaps, we can just agree to disagree here.</p>
<p>Yes, Meltzer did review all SAT Writing questions. The current version of the SAT, with its Writing section, premiered in March 2005. About four tests have been released each year since then, so reviewing them all is hardly an impossible task.</p>
<p>And yes, she is correct about collective nouns–which you’ll usually see in connection with pronoun-antecedent, rather than subject-verb agreement, errors.</p>
<p>If you have some actual counterexample from some actual SAT or PSAT that you need explained to you, then by all means post it here. Otherwise, stop sowing confusion. “My family always fight” (without the “s”) is British English, and it is not the sort of thing that appears on the SAT anyway.</p>
<p>Usage grammar by Thomas Farge has an entire section ( Lesson D) devoted to collective nouns being either singular or plural with many examples of both. An entire page…</p>
<p>But, Erica Meltzer’s grammar book has collective nouns as only being singular.</p>
<p>The question I asked - Does the SAT writing treat all collective nouns as being singular?</p>
<p>I guess this is just one of those questions that will have to filed away as unanswerable.</p>