Words That Work ... or Don't

There is Something You Should Know About There’s

What’s wrong with these statements:

  • There is three things I need to get done this morning.
  • There is all sorts of circumstances that affect the outcome
  • There is times to speak and times to listen.

And what about these:

  • There’s three things I need to get done this morning.
  • There’s all sorts of circumstances that affect the outcome.
  • There’s times to speak and times to listen.

You don’t have to be a grammar scholar to know that the verb is denotes singular and the verb are denotes plural. We know that There are three things … There are all sorts … There are times … use the correct plural verb form.

Yet the contraction there’s is often universally applied, even though there are would be grammatically correct. I guarantee that you would more often hear the incorrect there’s used in each of those sentences than you would the correct there are.

I nominate there’s as the most misused and abused contraction of our time. Start listening for it, and make sure that you aren’t taking an incorrect shortcut. Remember this from syndicated columnist William Raspberry:

“Good English, well spoken and well written, will open more doors than a college degree. Bad English will slam doors you didn’t even know existed.”

Ruthless Editor follows The Associated Press Stylebook and Briefing on Media Law guidelines for word and punctuation usage. Webster's New World College Dictionary serves as a secondary reference.

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