<ol>
<li>(Many of those) involved (were) professionals who, (in recognition) of their accomplishments in previous projects, (had been given) new assignments.</li>
</ol>
<p>Answer is E... WHY? Shouldn't it be D ? since the subject is professionals? and it should be have been given?</p>
<p>The people were already professionals when they were involved in something that happened in the past. You know this because “involved” is in the past tense. Because you’re talking about what happened after PREVIOUS projects that they completed even before the past tense, you have to use “had been given.” </p>
<p>If the professionals were involved now, you would use have been given: “Many professionals currently involved have been given new assignments.”</p>
<p>I see… Still, is the subject in this sentence professionals? and when there is “many” used in a sentence, does it automatically mean that the subject is plural?</p>
<p>I’m not sure of all the fancy terms in grammar, but here is how I think of this question…pretty simple. The people “were” involved in it, so thats a while ago, and at the time that they were involved, they’d been given new assignments. The key here is had vs. have. They “have” been given connotes that its happening now, but they “had” connotes it was something ongoing in the past.</p>
<p>The word “professionals” is NOT the subject of the sentence. It is in fact a part of the predicate. Compare these two sentences:</p>
<p>Many of them were green.
Many of them were professionals.</p>
<p>You probably wouldn’t think that “green” is the subject of the first sentence. But, the two sentences are basically alike, and the second sentence is basically the one in your example. In each example, “many” is the subject of the verb “were.” The phrase “of them” is a prepositional phrase modifying the subject term. The terms “green” and “professionals” are terms in the predicate that describe the subject term.</p>
<p>So you’re saying that Many always requires a plural verb?</p>
<p>Off the top of my head, I cannot think of a sentence where “many” would take a singular verb. That could be because I lack imagination, but I think it’s because “many” always takes a plural verb.</p>