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OT - singular or plural
ninian-uk
March 11, 2006, 11:47 p.m. (Message 44638)
But - possibly - the United States 'ARE' (since there is more than one state/country in the Union) - though I admit that I usually say "the US 'IS'..." Florida is just as much a state as France, and Louisiana is just as much a state as Lichtenstein..... (and we'll all be in the United States of Europe soon :~) David Berkeley, Gloucestershire UK
Sorry to disagree on two points. Organizations are singular, as in the RSCDS is, though its branches and dancers are. Second point, possibly political, for which I appologize. It is correct to say that the United States are because, when referring to the states, but it is also OK to say that the United States is when referring to it as a whole. Part of this problem is political propaganda, in that by the common political science definition of a state, the U.S. is one, and its states, as those of Brazil, and Mexico, are really provinces no matter what they call themselves. This is because they all fail step three of a three step test. 1. Territory-yes, 2. population-yes. 3. sovereignty-no. Therefore the U.S. having all three is a state, and its states are not In the UK, the UK is a state, which now has both provinces and nations within it. For a short time the UK was one state with nations that happened to be two kingdoms. Not sure what the present status is but in the 70´s, Northern Ireland is not a nation, but is a province of the United Kingdom, but Wales has never been a state, but was a nation that became a province of England. Nations neither require territory nor sovereignty, just people. So there was a Jewish state, and a Jewish province, in the historical past, and there is one now, but between a.d. 67 and 1947, there was only a Jewish nation. Yugoslavia was a state that included several nations, now these nations sort of correspond to the borders of several states. The Soviet Union, like the U.S. pretended it was a union of states, but it was actually one state, containing many nations, some of which have become states in recent history. This confusion has created problems in U.S. History, and it took a civil war to decide it. It is still a problem when one party says they belive in states rights, unless of course gays want to marry or citizens want to smoke a joint. Sorry Republicans, I know you like to say things at your conventions such as "the soveriegn state of x casts its votes for y" but the very fact that you have to put both sovereign and state in the same sentence indicates that you are confused.
On Sun, 2006-03-12 at 01:00 +0100, xxxxx@xxxxxxxxxx.xxx wrote: > Part of this problem is political propaganda, in that by the common > political science definition of a state, the U.S. is one, and its > states, as those of Brazil, and Mexico, are really provinces no matter > what they call themselves. This is because they all fail step three of > a three step test. This could be further complicated by the four states (Massachusetts, Virginia, Pennsylvania and Kentucky) that are officially designated commonwealths rather than states. There are historical reasons for the designation, but the only real difference today is that it creates opportunities to be pedantic (a favorite pastime of many of us on this list) by saying (e.g.) "Oh, Virginia isn't a state. It's a commonwealth." Carl Spain Waco Texas (The state in this union whose residents are most likely to take issue with Richard's statement that it is not sovereign; I've generally found it best just to smile and nod.) USA