The couple is going to purchase the house? Or the couple are going to purchase the house? Even after all my years of editing, I can still get tripped up trying to make verbs agree with collective ...

Over the years, I’ve learned a lot about English grammar and usage — most of which I promptly forgot. And not for lack of use. Every day I apply what I’ve learned to catch and fix writers’ mistakes.

Collective nouns can be taken as singular or plural, according to whether the word is seen as a unit or as individual items. For example: Thefamilyis proud ofitslineage. Family is seen as a whole unit ...

Is ‘majority’ singular or plural? The word “majority” can be either singular or plural, depending on whether we are talking about a group or collection of individuals or the individuals in a group. If ...

Of all the grammar concepts we have, "plural" seems to be one of the most straightforward. You got one thing? It's singular. Got more than one thing? It's plural. But alas, language is always less ...