<p>I know that when there can be times of ambiguous antecedents (ie. his/her) that can refer to 2 names, but what happens if the two names are different genders?</p>
<p>Ex. Afraid that they would be late to the party, Rob and Samantha decided to take her car.</p>
<p>Would her be ambiguous, since it could theoretically refer to rob or Samantha? Or would it not be because rob is obviously a guys name?</p>
<p>No, the example listed doesn’t make sense grammatically. If Rob and Samantha both own the car/share the car, then the sentence could read: “Afraid that they would be late to the party, Rob and Samantha decided to take their car.”</p>
<p>If it’s only Samantha’s car, then the sentence would have to be reworded, or you could say “…take the car” or “…take a car.”</p>
<p>I don’t think it’s an ambiguous reference.
Compare to this:
Rob and Samantha decided to visit her family.</p>
<p>what if Rob is short for Robin Scherbatsky from himym?
what if samantha really just the name of an effeminate man?</p>
<p>The way I see it, it’s a trend but not necessarily a rule for female names to end with a vowel or male names to end without. </p>
<p>I haven’t yet come across a case in official SAT tests where you have to determine the gender of a person from a name to check for pronoun errors. I had found one such question in Barron’s, though, and I got it wrong because I couldn’t tell the gender.</p>
<p>Your question is a good one but pointless because the SAT would never take you on such a question. </p>
<p>In cases of ambiguous pronouns, the genders will be the same. For instance, look at this question from a real test.</p>
<p>Neither Ms. Perez nor Ms. Tanaka believes that watching as much television as her son Sam does will lead to anything productive. </p>
<p>“her” was underlined and is the correct answer because it is ambiguous in terms of which woman “her” refers to. Now if College Board were, by some chance, to change Ms. Tanaka to a guy’s name, then would “her” be wrong? No, because it could then only refer to Ms. Perez, but like I said, College Board would never do that. </p>
<p>Consider another real question that is tricky in terms of ambiguous pronouns.</p>
<p>The essayist writing on art in America was less concerned with why funding was decreasing than with whether it was becoming less popular with the public. No error.</p>
<p>Now “it” was underlined and is the correct answer. Why? Well, in this sentence, it is obvious that what is becoming less popular is art, and so many students mistakenly assume “it” must be correct. But “it” could also refer to the “funding,” which was mentioned immediately before. So in cases where you have two singular subjects and a singular pronoun can refer to either, then it is wrong. But then there are exceptions which is why pronouns can be so confusing.</p>
<p>Consider another real question.</p>
<p>The city of Conway, Wales, now surrounds the medieval walls and castle that originally enclosed and protected it. No error</p>
<p>“it” was underlined and many students mistakenly choose it as the correct answer, assuming that it can refer to either the city or the castle. But in this sentence, it is obvious that the compound subjects of the walls and the castle are protecting the city, thereby making the answer to this question E, a no error.</p>
<p>You must also be careful on these types of questions.</p>
<p>Snowmobiles may now be ridden within the previously restricted part of the national park, even without explicit permission for it. No error</p>
<p>“it” was underlined and is the correct answer because in context, the sentence is referring to permission to ride the snowmobiles, but a lot of students mistakenly assume that “it” correctly refers to the park, because they think, “well, sure, can’t you have permission to a park?” But no, not really, you might have permission to enter a park, not permission for a park in itself.</p>
<p>The 4 examples I have given are taken from real tests released by College Board in the Blue Book or through Q&A services.</p>
<p>Hope that helps.</p>
<p>I get all your examples, but the fact is there was a question exactly like this on tr October 5 sat.</p>