We do not usually treat the weekly homework questions on this page . All I do is provide the right answers for the previous assignment . My belief is that once this is done , everyone will be able to make necessary corrections in terms of what they might have missed . Besides , whether on the phone or via email , many people ask me follow - up questions that I try as much as possible to answer .
Today , however , we are taking off by treating one of the three questions given last week — question two . It is the one that inspired the title of today ’ s lesson . And I decided to give it more time because many people got it wrong. Here it is :
I pray that God … all of us.
( a ) will protecting (b ) protects ( c ) protect
( d) has being protecting
The correct answer is protect , not protects !
The question becomes controversial because the grammar governing it falls under what is called the subjunctive mood . It is not to be treated in line with the general concord rule of the singular subject taking a singular verb ( He goes there regularly ) or plural subject
cuddling a plural verb (They go there regularly ) . Rather , the subjunctive mood , in the context under consideration , retains the base form of a verb, that is the one without an s . We have discussed the topic on more than one occasion in the Punch English Class . But because it is tricky and many people hadn ’t joined the class at the time, the question became an albatross last week .
Consider the following sentences to appreciate the concept of the subjunctive mood :
He goes there. (Correct, normal grammar structure )
You have to ensure that he goes there . ( Wrong , because it is in the subjunctive mood . )
You have to ensure that he go there. ( Correct, subjunctive mood )
You have to ensure that they go there . ( Correct, subjunctive mood ).
Akin went there last week . (Correct, normal grammar structure )
He ensured that Akin went there last week . ( Wrong , subjunctive mood )
He ensured that Akin go there last week . ( Correct, subjunctive mood )
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The other subjunctive constructions you must watch include :
He suggests / suggested that …
She recommends that …
We demand that …
They are requesting that …
He suggests that Sade goes there tomorrow . ( Wrong )
He suggests that Sade go there tomorrow . ( Correct)
We demand that President Buhari appears before the Senate next week . (Wrong )
We demand that President Buhari appear before the Senate next week . (Correct)
While recommending that you revisit our earlier lessons on subjunctive mood – they are available on The PUNCH website – let us now see how the concept directly affects the last week ’s question that looks harmless but later proved to be deadly . And , believe you me, subjunctive mood clauses are like that : they look simple but are engaging . Clauses in the prayer mood , with the word God included or not , fall under the category . What you thus need to do is to ascertain if the sentence is in the normal grammar structure or in the subjunctive . Often, when it is in the prayer mood , the subjunctive rule applies :
God gives and takes . (Correct, normal sentence structure )
I pray that God gives me money . (Wrong , prayer mode , subjunctive too )
I pray that God give me money . (Correct)
God protects this community . ( Correct, normal sentence structure )
I pray that God protects this community . ( Wrong …)
I pray that God protect this community . ( Correct)
What this suggests , therefore , is that in the course of praying, we commit certain blunders , and this is what a mischievous teacher like me will describe as committing errors in or with the name of God.
I know you find it tough to survive. My prayer is, ‘God helps you ’. ( Wrong )
I know you are finding it tough to survive . My prayer is, ‘God help you ’ . ( Correct)
Note that I have not said that it is every time you see ‘God ’ in a sentence that the verb to be used must be the base form – the singular without the s. It is only when the construction is in the subjunctive mood as I have explained above . I need to stress this so that you will not write It is God who KNOW the heart when you are supposed to write It is God who KNOWS the heart .
Let me remind us about another God -expression that is generally mishandled: For God ’s sake. Note that the expression is not
For God sake; there must be an apostrophe and an s after God because we are indicating possession. It is like For John ’s sake, For the man ’s sake etc. As we also discussed in this class recently , other sake- phrases you must watch include For heaven ’ s sake, For posterity ’s sake and For continuity ’s sake.
Pronouncing tomb
If you were expecting us to continue our discussion on oral English today , sorry , the subjunctive palaver has taken our time. However, we can round off ( not up ) with hints on how to handle another commonly mispronounced word – tomb .
The noun , tomb , should remind us about a category of words we treated last week . These are those that end with b that has to be silenced during pronunciation . You remember that we said bomb should be pronounced as bom — not bomb — and comb should sound like koum — not komb .
Two errors are , however , usually involved in the case of tomb . Apart from the fact that many still erroneously retain the b , they get the pronunciation of the vowel o wrong. It should sound as oo ( u : ) — like what you have in tool and not o as in top or tomtom .
So , tomb should be pronounced toom (/ tu : m / ) — not tOmB !
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