| Posted: Saturday, October 17, 2015 12:29:36 PM |
Joined: 5/7/2015
Posts: 62
Neurons: 1,345
My parents have a car. THIS IS TRUE.
My family has/have a car.
I don't know whether to use has or have in the second one.
| Posted: Saturday, October 17, 2015 12:56:56 PM |
Rank: Advanced Member
Joined: 9/12/2011
Posts: 38,540
Neurons: 283,295
Location: Livingston, Scotland, United Kingdom
Hi again.
They are both generally acceptable. You will probably find that American speakers use one more often, while British speakers use the other.
The difference is only how you (the speaker) 'view' your family.
If you consider the family to be 'some people related to me', then you can use the plural 'have'.
If you consider your family to be 'a single group who act together', you would use the singular 'has'.
I think that you will find the 'has' much more common - but I may be wrong. . .
I was slightly wrong (or 'old-fashioned') - British writers seem to have been using 'has' more than 'have' since 1990. American writers changed around 1930.
American English books.
British English books.
| Posted: Saturday, October 17, 2015 8:18:56 PM |
Rank: Advanced Member
Joined: 12/20/2012
Posts: 1,032
Neurons: 12,634
Thank you, DragOnspeaker,for going to the trouble of posting the graphs.
| Posted: Sunday, October 18, 2015 1:24:41 AM |
Joined: 9/16/2015
Posts: 4,572
Neurons: 529,941
Asanad wrote:
My parents have a car. THIS IS TRUE.
My family has/have a car.
I don't know whether to use has or have in the second one.
_______________________________________________________________________
There are many nouns in the English language that take both a singular and plural verb. It depends on the sense of use. One such noun is "family". In formal language and in examinations, if the word "family" conveys the sense of one whole unit, it is usual to use a singular verb. A plural verb is used, if the members of the family are considered as separate entities.
- The Smith family still has its farm over there.
- My family has always been close.
But we usually say:
- My family have decided to move to Australia; my father has got a job there, my mother likes the medical facilities in Australia while my sister feels that Australia has better educational facilities.