[HPforGrownups] Re: Grammar question

[John Walton]

No: HPFGUIDX 10315

Amanda Lewanski wrote:

>> The Committee grants its permission to build.
> 
> British: The Committee grant its permission to build.

Hmm. Does this --> sound better?

The Committee grant THEIR permission to build.

>> And the Committee puts its (the signatures of its members) on the
>> document....
> 
> British: And the Committee put its signatures on the document.

The Committee put THEIR signatures on the document.

> Only the second sounds "right" to me, for whatever reason. I read
> Watership Down a jillion times at an impressionable age, and Richard
> Adams uses what I've identified as British usage, so that's probably why
> any of it does.

Does that help?

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John Walton                 john at walton.to

"Con-ser-va-tive, n. A statesman who is enamoured of existing evils, as
distinguished from the Liberal, who wishes to replace them with others."
--Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary", 1842-c.1914

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