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I got an article back rejected saying "The sentence There is a variety of... should read There are a variety of...". While I wrote it, I considered the word "variety" to be the verb's object and "there are" sounds a bit awkward to me. On second thought, though, it has a point because "a variety of" describes the word that follows, so it can't be the object. I'm confused. Anyone care to share his take on this?

By the way, the review times are down again and we are back to getting rejections for misplaced commas! Hurray!!!

In my humble opinion

The verb "is" qualifies the collective, singular noun "variety."

Personally I would just rewrite the sentence, perhaps using "various" to avoid another issue.

mnicol22 wrote:I got an article back rejected saying "The sentence There is a variety of... should read There are a variety of...". While I wrote it, I considered the word "variety" to be the verb's object and "there are" sounds a bit awkward to me. On second thought, though, it has a point because "a variety of" describes the word that follows, so it can't be the object. I'm confused. Anyone care to share his take on this?

By the way, the review times are down again and we are back to getting rejections for misplaced commas! Hurray!!!

It could almost be either, depending on what follows. For instance, if you're saying "There is a variety of milk that is unhealthy for infants," your sentence would be correct. Variety would be the noun in the sentence, and the definition of variety would be "a kind or sort."

If you said, "There are a variety of choices available," it would be correct to use "are" as the definition would be "a number of different things." (To avoid passive phrasing and be clear, you could also say, "Various choices are available.")

Dictionary.com has these definitions and the usage note that follows:


va·ri·e·ty   [vuh-rahy-i-tee] Show IPA noun, plural -ties, adjective
noun
1.the state of being varied or diversified: to give variety to a diet.
2.difference; discrepancy.
3.a number of different types of things, especially ones in the same general category: a large variety of fruits.
4.a kind or sort.
5.a different form, condition, or phase of something: varieties of pastry; a variety of economic reforms.

Usage note
3, 5. As a collective noun, variety, when preceded by a, is often treated as a plural: A variety of inexpensive goods are sold here. When preceded by the, it is usually treated as a singular: The variety of products is small.

Thanks, jellygator! I think that sorts it out.

I think that in such cases it might be better (or easier, I admit!) to just rephrase, as Judith suggests, to avoid such tricky stuff. At least in the cases where I can't really figure it out.

Good advice above.

On a side note, rephrasing isn't necessarily all about avoiding tricky stuff. An old English teacher used to mark us students down whenever we started a sentence with "There are" or "There is" - he hated it! It was one of his pet "weak writing" peeves. He always wanted us to think of another way to say the same thing, and he was usually right.

For example:
"There are a variety of reasons why he acted this way" could be rewritten as "He acted this way for several reasons" or "He acted this way because he felt the phrase was wordy, vague, and passive."

Rephrasing could definitely help in avoiding the tricky part of verb selection, but it could also strengthen the sentence by making it more concise, active, or descriptive.

Whenever I use there is/are, I hear my English teacher's voice. When I ignore him (and I do sometimes), I feel lazy. He was an awesome teacher!

Thanks for chiming in, Celeste.

I agree with you, rephrasing may help the writer say things in a more concise way. However, there are certain cliches that haunt non-native English speakers for life. I'm not really fond of using "There is/are" at the beginning of a sentence but it sometimes comes habitually because I was taught that passive voice is more formal. Its use was actually encouraged in this sort of writing.

The quality of knowledge a student gets depends to a great extent on the teacher's competency. In this respect I am grateful for the teachers I had. It appears, though, that some notions are valued dearly in ESL circles. They are hard to shed and inadvertently make their way into our efforts to use the language properly.

Obsessively focusing on formality is a huge mistake in my opinion. Children are often taught to talk like 60-year-old legal representatives. I catch myself doing that sometimes too and it's quite annoying! As a teacher myself, I'd find it creepily disturbing to hear a 10-year-old say "The party is being held at John's house."