synthesis

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The boys left the school without permission. Their teacher lectured them.

1. The boys' teacher lectured the boys for leaving the school without permission.

2. The teacher of the boys lectured them for leaving the xchool without permission.

3. The boys' teacher lectured them for leaving the school without permission.

Which are the correct sentences?

Many thanks.

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Type: Discussion • Score: 1 • Views: 1,892 • Replies: 25

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Sentence 1 is fine. Sentence 3 might be okay, depending on what precedes it. It's necessary that the "them" be clear. If there is no preceding sentence, then sentence 1 is the correct one.

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Re: synthesis
Sentence 1 is wrong because "the boys" is repeated.

Sentence 2 is bad because "The teacher of the boys" is clumsy and would not be used by a native speaker or writer.

Sentence 3 is OK.

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I disagree, contrex. It is not incorrect to repeat "the boys." You don't know what has preceded. There could be more than one "them."

If it's absolutely clear that "them" refers to the boys, then yes, sentence 3 is the best choice.

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Roberta wrote:

I disagree, contrex. It is not incorrect to repeat "the boys." You don't know what has preceded. There could be more than one "them."

If it's absolutely clear that "them" refers to the boys, then yes, sentence 3 is the best choice.

But you do know what preceded. Read the question.

The boys left the school without permission. Their teacher lectured them.

I still say repetition of "the boys" in sentence 1 is not only ugly and clumsy but wrong and bad synthesis.

Consider this...

The cat climbed onto the roof. Its owner rescued it.

1. The cat's owner resued the cat from the roof.
2. The owner of the cat rescued it from the roof.
3. The cat's owner rescued it from the roof.

OK I will concede that 2 is OK, if a little stiff, but 1? Never!

The cat is explicitly mentioned once. Now we can say "it" to refer to it. Sentence (1) is how a poor student aged about 9 would write the sentence.

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Should have paid attention to the title of the thread. Sentence 3 is the one.

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Sentence 3 is the best, short expression of the idea. However, it is not "incorrect" to have repeated "the boys" in sentence 1. Whatever the context, it is still a grammatically correct sentence. It may be alleged to be clumsy, it may be alleged to be inelegant. One thing it is not, however, is incorrect.

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Setanta wrote:

Sentence 3 is the best, short expression of the idea. However, it is not "incorrect" to have repeated "the boys" in sentence 1. Whatever the context, it is still a grammatically correct sentence. It may be alleged to be clumsy, it may be alleged to be inelegant. One thing it is not, however, is incorrect.

We are asked to make a synthesis of the two sentences. One part of that is avoiding inelegance, repetition and redundancy. We are not just asked to say which of three sentences is "correct" in some formal sense. We have a particular context in which to operate.

Therefore only sentence 3 will do.

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I could not agree with you less.

I have acknowledged that sentence 3 is the best choice. It is the best choice in simple terms of the expression of the language, and with regard to synthesis.

That sentence 3 is a better choice in no way makes sentence 1 incorrect. Particularly, repeating "boys" does not make it incorrect.

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Setanta wrote:

I could not agree with you less.

I have acknowledged that sentence 3 is the best choice. It is the best choice in simple terms of the expression of the language, and with regard to synthesis.

That sentence 3 is a better choice in no way makes sentence 1 incorrect. Particularly, repeating "boys" does not make it incorrect.

My native speaker friends say that sentence 3 is the correct choice, sentence 2 is acceptable, but sentence 1 is incorrect because of the needless repetition of 'boys' as it serves no purpose.

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The only one of us I'm certain is a native English speaker is me.

All three of us agree that sentence 3 is the best choice.

None of us thinks that sentence 2 is the right choice.

The disagreement lies in sentence 1. Both Setanta and I think that sentence 1 is not an incorrect sentence. It's awkard but not wrong as an English sentence. However, it is not a good example of sythesis.

Contrex disagrees with us; he says it's incorrect.

I think that sums it up.

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I vote for #3 as the best sentence.

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Roberta wrote:

The only one of us I'm certain is a native English speaker is me.

Contrex disagrees with us; he says it's incorrect.

My "native English speaker" credentials are that I was born in Kings College Hospital, Denmark Hill, Camberwell, London SE5, in 1952. My parents were both English. I went to Rosendale Infants school, Rosendale Junior Mixed School, and Alleyns School, all in Dulwich, London. I studied English Literature and French at Preston Polytechnic, where I got a 2.2 BA degree. [Blame the marijuana.] I worked for 30 years as a teacher and later as a translator. I lived in Britain until 2002 when I went to live in Perpignan, France.

I wrote,

Quote:

Sentence 1 is wrong because "the boys" is repeated.

I meant that it is a wrong answer, an incorrect answer, a multiple choice to be avoided, planted for a reason, [there is usually at least one] to the question as set, irrespective of its strictly grammatical status, which I did not actually call into question.

When composing exam or test papers in multiple choice format, it is not just a question of rewarding the "right" answer. Frequently, for diagnostic or other reasons, one inserts "trap" choices which target various things, eg specific failures of comprehension, guessing, etc.

(One thing I used to drum into students before exams - READ AND THINK ABOUT THE QUESTION!)

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Re: synthesis

Yoong Liat wrote:

3. The boys' teacher lectured them for leaving the school without permission.

A pronoun refers back to the immediately preceding noun or noun phrase. The preceding noun phrase here is not, however, "boys" but rather "boys' teacher." That's not a plural noun, therefore "them" is incorrect. The only proper pronoun that would refer to "boys' teacher" would be either "him" or "her," depending upon whether the teacher is a man or woman (or, to be more accurate, in this sentence it would be "himself" or "herself" because of its reflexive quality).

Now, of course, the vast majority of English speakers would understand this sentence perfectly well as "the boys' teacher lectured the boys for leaving the school without permission," but sentence 3 technically does not say that. Only sentence 1 says that. The repetition of "boys" in sentence 1, therefore, is not only correct, it is essential.

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joefromchicago, without wishing to be rude, that is nonsense.

A pronoun usually refers to something already mentioned in a sentence or piece of text. That "something" does not have to be a noun phrase. "The boys' teacher" is equivalent in meaning to "the teacher of the boys". Therefore "them" refers to the boys. Are you saying that we cannot say "The car's driver drove it erratically", or "the plane's pilot made it loop the loop"?

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contrex wrote:

joefromchicago, without wishing to be rude, that is nonsense.

No rudeness taken. But you're still wrong.

contrex wrote:

A pronoun usually refers to something already mentioned in a sentence or piece of text. That "something" does not have to be a noun phrase. "The boys' teacher" is equivalent in meaning to "the teacher of the boys". Therefore "them" refers to the boys. Are you saying that we cannot say "The car's driver drove it erratically", or "the plane's pilot made it loop the loop"?

As I said before, those sentences would be perfectly understandable to the vast majority of English speakers, but they are technically not correct, since the pronoun doesn't refer to the preceding noun. As such, it is not accurate to say that "boys" is repeated in sentence 1, because "boys'" isn't the same word as "boys."

The sentences that you offer are the kind that are written all the time. In the majority of cases, there is little chance for misinterpretation. In large part, that's because the pronoun can't refer to the noun phrase (i.e. "it" can't refer to a car's driver or a plane's pilot, any more than "them" can refer to a "boys' teacher").

But what about a sentence like this: "The boy's teacher called his parents." Whose parents did he call? The boy's parents or the teacher's parents? Under your interpretation, I suppose that it would be the former, but technically, it must be the latter, because "his" has to refer to the entire noun phrase. To avoid confusion, that sentence should be rewritten to make the pronoun unambiguous or replace it with a noun -- e.g. "The boy's teacher called his own parents" or "the boy's teacher called the boy's parents."

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Quote:

those sentences would be perfectly understandable to the vast majority of English speakers, but they are technically not correct,

There speaks a prescriptivist...

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contrex wrote:

Quote:
those sentences would be perfectly understandable to the vast majority of English speakers, but they are technically not correct,

There speaks a prescriptivist...

That means my native speaker friends are all wrong. They all agree as follows:

"The boys' teacher lectured them for leaving the school without permission" is the best answer.

"The teacher of the boys lectured them for leaving the school without permission" is acceptable.

"The boys' teacher lectured the boys for leaving the school without permission" is, to them, poor style.

None say that the sentences are technically incorrect.

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contrex wrote:

Quote:
those sentences would be perfectly understandable to the vast majority of English speakers, but they are technically not correct,

There speaks a prescriptivist...

Well, when the question is "which one of these sentences is correct," the prescriptivist position is assumed. If the question allowed us to choose which sentences make sense, I'd choose all of them, but sentence 1 has the additional advantage of being grammatically correct.

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This goes to show how difficult the English grammar is, and many of us who chose #3 did so on comprehension - as I did. I believe that's the overriding issue of communication; simplicity and comprehension.

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