When someone from Britain speaks, Americans hear a "British accent"...

[Grant Edwards]

On 2005-10-07, DaveM <asma61 at dsl.pipex.com> wrote:

>>For example: In British English one uses a plural verb when the
>>subject consists of more than one person.  Sports teams,
>>government departments, states, corporations etc. are 
>>grammatically plural.  In American, the verb agrees with the
>>word that is the subject, not how many people are denoted by
>>that word.
>>
>>In sports (thats "sport" for you Brits):
>
> Yes.
>
>> American: Minnesota is behind 7-0.  The Vikings are behind 7-0.
>>  British: Minnesota are behind 7-0. The Vikings are behind 7-0.
>
> True.
>
>>In politics:
>
>>  American: The war department has decided to cancel the program.
>>   British: The war department have decided to cancel the program.
>
> Not sure about this one. They may be used interchangeably as neither strikes
> me as sounding "odd".

It could be that both are used in British English and I only
notice the "have" usage.  In US English it's always "has"
because "deptartment" is considered singular:

"departement has" and "departements have"

For some reason I find this sort of thing fascinating enough to
have download the entire "story of English" series off Usenet...

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  Yow! Now we can
                                  at               become alcoholics!
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