Ask yourself, what is infectious? Is it the girl that's infectious or is it the vitality and humor that are infectious? Other people don't catch the girl, they catch the vitality and humor, so it's "vitality and humor" that is the head of the noun phrase. That's two items, so the sentence takes a plural verb, "were".
I suppose I didn't explain my answer well enough. The reasons I said "The girl's vitality and humor" was the entire subject were that, firstly, "The" applies to the whole of the phrase "girl's vitality and humor" (which, acting as a noun phrase, could be substituted by almost anything with the same effect) -- and secondly, "The girl's vitality and humor" could all be replaced by "they" (yes, vitality and humor are the important part of the subject, but the fact that the whole of the phrase can be included in the substitution shows that all pieces are a part of the subject, if it is the whole subject that is desired). On a side train of thought, I also figured that the sentence could be expanded this way: "The girl's vitality and the girl's humor were..." making it a compound subject, but showing it to be the subject nonetheless. Sorry if this makes no sense, I just wanted to put up my reasoning in case there was a flaw in it! I haven't taken a grammar class for over a year, so I may be a little rusty. I guess my reasoning could be summed up as: "The girl's vitality and humor" is acting as a noun phrase, which, in basic terms makes it the (complete) subject.
No, that's not right. "The" qualifies just "girl". Whose vitality and humor? The girl's. Yes, that analysis is correct. Yes, and that's why it takes "were", not "was". It's doing more that acting as a noun phrase, it is a noun phrase!
here's how this sentence would be diagrammed [sorry i can't do it properly here, with all those nice straight and dialgonal lines!]: sentence: The girl’s vitality and humor were infectious. compound subject/nouns: vitality and humor modifying the subject: what/whose vitality and humor?... 'the girl's... predicate/verb: were object/predicate adjective: were what?... 'infectious' for all the whys and wherefores, i suggest you browse these sites/pages... http://grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/objects.htm http://www.google.com/webhp?rls=ig#...=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.&fp=c4c796b09a129ab4
According to my reference grammar the subject is the entire noun phrase: "The girl's vitality and humor". "Vitality and humor" is the head of the noun phrase, so it's the bit that governs conjugation of the verb, but it's only part of the subject.
I read this, and at first I wanted to claim just "Vitality" and "Humor" were the subjects, with the rest of the relating words merely detailing the subject, but upon research, as I see others have already done, it is indeed the entire phrase "The girl's vitality and humor".
Yeah, that was impressive. Plus kudos to Amanda who perfectly nailed it immediately in post 2! Most educational thread I've read in a while...
ok, so i'm going by grammar rules i was taught... if there are 'new grammar' rules governing this matter [just as there was 'new math' a way back] i'm not aware of them... can anyone provide a link to such a rule, please?... if already done a page or 2 back, please point me in the right direction... thanks!
I referred to the Longman Student Grammar of Spoken and Written English, which was a set text on the grammar module of my recent English Language degree so I think it's a reasonable authority, but the rules are the same as I was taught at school in the 1960s. Wikipedia agrees that the subject is a noun phrase, not just the head of the noun phrase, and for instance identifies the subject in "His constant hammering was very annoying" as "His constant hammering", not just "hammering", which I think is a direct parallel to "The girl's humor and vitality."
ah, so... the 60's, however, were 2 decades later than when i was getting '100%' grades [they didn't use letter grades then, either] for diagramming sentences!
So it might be a new-fangled grammar, then! Do you have any references for the subject being the head of the noun phrase rather than the entire phrase? I'd be interested in following up such a change, and I'm a reader at the British Library so I should be able to follow up any references you have.
heck, no!... sorry, but i'm almost 3/4 of a century away from my grammar school years and certainly don't have any of my schoolbooks from back then...
