Miscellaneous Forum

Yes, that Beyonce song...If I Were A Boy...

Grammatically is it correct ? Or should it be If I was a boy ?

How about :
If I were you

or

If I was you....?


If I were a teacher...OR if I was a teacher ?
if she were to go there...or if she was to go there ?


'WERE' or 'WAS'...

Please give some comments.

P/S I have searched on the Net & most people prefer 'WERE'.
It sounds more correct...but is it grammatically correct ?

'If I were ' (sounds odd out of context!) is grammatically correct in UK English if one is speaking formally. 'I was' is more informal but not totally incorrect, in practical usage.

'I were' only goes with a conditional clause, of course....you wouldn't say it in other contexts (although it is used as a general substitute for 'I was' in more than one English dialect).

You can trust the BBC (well, about correct UK English anyway).

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/grammar/learnit/learnitv6.shtml

It works the same for he/she too, with a conditional clause.

'If she were to go there' is grammatically correct but 'if she was to go there' is frequently used.

If I Were a Boy .... - hmmm that's wrong to me. Where's the plural?
If I Were Boys .... (and of course that is wrong because "I" can't be plural.

This acceptance sounds to me like the American acceptance of the annoyingly incorrect: "I could care less ..." When they mean the exact opposite.
They should be saying "I couldn't care less". But they are so used to hearing the incorrect version they mimick it now.

<<'If I were ' (sounds odd out of context!) is grammatically correct in UK English if one is speaking formally>>

Also correct in American English. (Conditional tense.)

This isn't plural. It is a remain of older and more formal English, a conditional tense that is hardly used any more nowadays. Equivalent to the conjunctive in other languages like German or Italian, which is slowly disappearing, too, because most people do not care about good and sophisticated language any more.

I knew I was probably wrong but it still sounds incorrect :-)
I was taught: I was ..... / They were .....

This isn't plural. It is a remain of older and more formal English, a conditional tense that is hardly used any more nowadays. Equivalent to the conjunctive in other languages like German or Italian, which is slowly disappearing, too, because most people do not care about good and sophisticated language any more.

You were taught the right way kiwi. Your example is of the indicative tense and it is "I was", "we were" in this case.

It's when you use the conditional tense that "were" is used even in the singular.
"If I were" and "if we were".

I'm used to "if I were" but the one I think is disappearing (unrelated to the OP question) is:

"I shall be", "I shall call", etc. I use "I will be" and "I will call" more readily. Hope I'm not too wrong... :)

"shall" just sounds archaic to me.

Thanks Lou, you explained it perfectly. I speak English but don't remember the structure or the names etc very well.

ok how about this phrase:

its about time we did this or its about time we had a picnic.

shouldn't this be:

its about time we do this or its about time we have a picnic

welcome. I meant to thank Kathrin for her post above and forgot. sorry K!

about "It's about time we did this." -- I think "it's about time" should not be taken literally to mean "now if about the right time for... (something.)"

I think it should be understood as meaning "We waited too long already, we should have done this earlier."
Now, not sure that this allows us to use the past and write "did"... But writing "did" implies the past, which is when we think we should have done something. The verb expresses a frustrated wish for something we would have liked to do in the past. This is my feeling about the expression, not the rule of law. :)

Anybody who learned English as a second language knows that "IF I WERE" is grammatically correct.
Jeannette

So does that mean "If I Was" is incorrect?

...Just so I start "talkin' proper" ;-)

"If I were a carpenter and you were a lady, would you marry me anyway, would you have my baby?"

And wouldn't that sound stupid with "If I was a carpenter..." haha :-)
OK I'm learned now :-))

that was nicely explained Lou :-)

i wonder what Beyonce would think if she knew ppl at VT are discussing her grammar

Or is she just the deliverer ... ;-)

I was taught that "if I were" was the subjunctive tense.

Jeannette

Ger:

i think she will like it or at least be pleasantly surprised.

btw, residents of our province of Newfoundland (pronounced NewfinLAND)and Labrador have english of their own. a colleague at office always uses sentences like "she don't know what she is doing" or "he don't want to go there".

my own spoken english comprises of memorized pet sentences and i can't handle variation LOL.

Yes exactly, familiarity (and blame tv and other media most of the time) makes some useages acceptable.

Lou, you just explained perfectly. That's how I learned in the school.

Also, I ended getting it back when I listened to an audiobook released by Modern Scholar - "A way with words" by Michael Drout. The second time I found it reinforced was by a book by Lynne Truss, then David Crystal follows and so forth.

=)

English is my second language. Even tough I often find my skills inadequate, I get by fairly well. But I've always had a problem with may/might. What's the difference? When to use what? I might do that.. You may be right..

Can you clever people help me?

English is also my 2nd language. :)
To me, may is Present Tense & might is Past Tense.

Saying that, may can be used in the present situation and in the future situation.

I may go there anytime.
I may go there tomorrow.

Whereas might, I use in the present situation, in the future & also in the past situation.

I might just stay at home everyday.
They might watch TV tomorrow night.
She might pass her exams if she studied hard.
(Meaning, she could pass her exams if she studied hard).

Might is a polite word, just like could, would, should.

Could, would & should can be used in the past, in the present & also in the future...just like might.

Hope that helps. :)

Only a very subtle difference there and, in everyday UK English (formal or informal), the words are essentially interchangeable.

'Might' is actuually just the past tense of 'may', but we use it as in e.g. 'I might go shopping tomorrow'.

Wiki (hmm) says:

>"May" should only be used where the event in question is still possible, not for something that was possible in the past, or for a hypothetical present possibility.<

I may go shopping tomorrow.

I might have gone shopping, but it was too cold.

The more I think about it, the more I'm sure the words are used pretty interchangeably here...and vary in their usage from person to person. I don't think there is a grammatically correct usage in real life.

Might isn't a formal or 'polite' word though, honestly....it's just the past tense of may.

I speak only for UK English.

Okay, back to my original question...If I were....:)

This is my observation...
Often in a conversation, we like to ask, "If you were me, what would you do ?"

'were' signifies a past action or it could only be an idea that would/could be carried out.

Normally, we answer, "If I were you, I would..."
'were' here gives emphasis on the word you or on/to the first speaker.

So, let's put it in a context.
"If you were me, what would you do to avoid the accident ?"
"If I were you, I would just stop my car !"

This conversation implies of an incident that has happened in the past.
The answer, by using the word 'would' also implying a past action.

So, what about this sentence.
"If you were me, what will you do ?"

Although I think this is incorrect grammatically but people do speak this way.

To me, somebody is asking an opinion what would the other person do if the same thing will happen in the future.

Opened to debate ! :)

But in the UK you would also hear people respond 'Well, if I was you I'd stop the car'.

'Were' might be grammatically correct in that context, but in real life usage either 'was' or 'were' might be used and either would be acceptable.

English is a living language and it changes all the time. There have been changes even during my lifetime (not as long as you might think, in linguistic terms!). For example, the spelling 'alright' is now seen everywhere whereas only a couple of decades ago only 'all right' was acceptable.

So worrying about the subtleties in meaning and usage of may/might or was/were (apart from the basic past tense thing) is really not worthwhile, imo. Here, no great stress is laid on any one 'correct' usage in either case.

No UK English speaker would ever say:

If you were me, what will you do?

We would say 'If you were me what would you do?'. To which the reply would be 'I would....'.

If you were me, what might you do.... I might...