Subject-verb agreement with compound subjects

Subjects joined by “and” usually take a plural form verb: English and math are my favorite subjects. The boy in the red car and the girl in the blue car race down the street recklessly. subject subject

Exceptions to this rule, part one: 1. Where the subjects both name the same person, place, thing, or idea: The winner and still champion of the boxing tournament is Sally. Note: “Sally” is a predicate nominative – noun or pronoun in the predicate that renames the subject. If we switch the subject with the predicate nominative, the sentence still says the same thing, and in this case, makes it obvious to use “is” and not “are.”

Exceptions to this rule, part two: 2. Where the conjunction is part of the name of a person, place, thing, or idea: Macaroni and cheese is my favorite food for dinner. Dewey, Cheatham, and Howe is retained as our law firm. |---------------- subject -----------------| |------------------------ subject --------------------------|

Singular subjects joined by “or” or “nor” take a singular form verb: Either Billy or Sally scores the highest on the test. Neither Billy nor Sally studies less than five hours for the test. subject subject

When a singular subject and plural subject are joined by “or” or “nor,” the verb agrees with the closest subject: subject subject Either the students or the teacher answers the phone when it rings. Neither the teacher nor the students answer the phone when it rings. subject subject

Do not let parenthetical information in a subject fool you into misreading the sentence: The team captain, as well as his players, is anxious. This is not the same, grammatically, as “the team captain and the players,” which would be treated as a plural subject. As it is written above, the subject is “captain,” which is singular.

In sentences beginning with "there is" or "there are," the subject follows the verb. Since "there" is not the subject, the verb agrees with what follows: adverb subject There are many questions still left unanswered.

Note: the word dollars (and other “amounts,” like weight) is a special case. When talking about an amount of money, use a singular verb, but when referring to the dollars themselves, use a plural verb: Five dollars is a lot of money. Dollars are often used instead of rubles in Russia. Fifty pounds is a lot of weight.