Regardless of their form or function, all aerodynamically enhanced, curved objects made for throwing have been called boomerangs by non-Australians ever since 1788, when Europeans saw Dharug-speaking men tossing "bumariny" in the area later known as Sydney.

a) Regardless of their form or function, all aerodynamically enhanced, curved objects made for throwing have been called boomerangs by non-Australians ever since 1788,

b) Regardless of their form or function, any aerodynamically enhanced, curved object made for throwing has been called a boomerang by non-Australians ever since 1788,

c) Ever since 1788, non-Australians have called all aerodynamically enhanced, curved objects made for throwing boomerangs, regardless of their form or function, from

d) Ever since 1788, any aerodynamically enhanced, curved object made for throwing has been called a boomerang by non-Australians, regardless of its form or function, from

e) Non-Australians have called all aerodynamically enhanced, curved objects made for throwing boomerangs ever since 1788, regardless of their form or function, from




In this problem, I chose C, however the OA is A. What's wrong with option C and why is A correct? I chose C because I was trying to avoid "by" since it is used for passive sentences. When is "by" appropriate? Also, I chose C because I've noticed that sentences that generally start off with dates in the introductory phrase is preferred; However, it is wrong in this problem. :s So now, i'm officially confused! heheh...

[edited by Stacey to correct a typo in the problem]

You have to match the non-underlined portion of the sentence (which must be correct because it isn't underlined!). It starts with "when" and the word when refers to a time or date (in this case, a date. That date needs to be placed right before the "when." C, D, and E do not put that date right before the "when" (that is, at the end of the answer choice).

Couple of things:
- a phrase such as "ever since 1788" can correctly go at the beginning, at the end, in the middle... there's no grammar rule that says it is preferred at the beginning of a sentence.
- passive is not wrong; a completely grammatically correct active sentence is preferred to a completely grammatically correct passive sentence. Don't pick based on active / passive unless you have already determined that your remaining choices are (a) completely grammatically correct and (b) maintain the same meaning as the original sentence. AFTER that, you can use active vs. passive as a tiebreak.

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Stacey Koprince
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ManhattanGMAT

If option (b) above started with - Regardless of its form or function, ....rest all same.

Then would B be correct?

i would say so.

a) Regardless of their form or function, all aerodynamically enhanced, curved objects made for throwing have been called boomerangs by non-Australians ever since 1788,

b) Regardless of their form or function, any aerodynamically enhanced, curved object made for throwing has been called a boomerang by non-Australians ever since 1788,


Is it because ... OBJECT is stated in the latter part of the sentence that we are assuning that the sentence will be right.. when ITS is placed int the former part of the sentence

Or

Is it because ANY must follow ITS., if so then what happened to SANAM pronouns ;-)

It is because cannot refer to "aerodynamically enhanced, curved object"



b) Regardless of their form or function, any aerodynamically enhanced, curved object made for throwing has been called a boomerang by non-Australians ever since 1788,

i'm not sure exactly what you're asking, but...

in (b), "their" is plural. the only plural to which it can refer is "non-Australians", which is clearly the wrong referent.

if you have "its" in an opening phrase (such as "regardless of its..."), then it automatically applies to the subject of the following clause, provided that this subject is singular.

Hi,Ron:
do we need all aerodynamically enhanced, curved objects to be the subject of the clause just because Regardless of their form or function precedes the clause with a comma?

Hi Stacey,
I don't understand why when must follow a time or data. I guess when could be a conjunctions and followed by a adverbial clause of time.

yes.

stacy is not saying that "when" MUST follow a time or date.
rather, she is saying that, IF the "when" is referring to a time or date, it should follow that time or date immediately.

Ron,
why is B still wrong if we change the "their" to "it"?

Actually,i think singular form is better than plural form to express this boomerang story.
as if plural form it may cause confusion---if one such thing appear, it should be called "a boomerang" or "a boomergs". you know, you are introducing a new name that people don't know its singular and plural forms.

so back to my query, I think if the "their" in B is changed to "it", it should be a right, even a better choice.

(or...if "any" is modifying a countable noun, it always means plural, which means the "object" should definitely be "objects"?... i don't think so though.)

Please do shed light on this. Thank you very much!

Ron,
why is B still wrong if we change the "their" to "it"?


He wrote that it would be correct.

so back to my query, I think if the "their" in B is changed to "it", it should be a right, even a better choice.

When the question, What if I changed this...? helps you to understand a grammatical issue, then it's useful. But be wary of asking it reflexively. And don't ask, Wouldn't this then be better than the OA? No, it wouldn't. Ever. Every wrong answer contains an error. No right answer contains an error, by GMAC's lights anyway. If you remove the error from a wrong answer, it doesn't have any fewer than the zero errors the right answer has.

Hi,
What is the grammatical difference between the "from when" construction and the "when" construction in the options ?

I was stuck between A and D, eventually chose A as it sounded better to my ear. But please shed some light on the way choice D ends.

in that choice, the presence of both "from" and "since" constitutes redundancy.

the 1788 modifier is also placed in a location that makes it difficult to figure out that the event mentioned at the end of the sentence took place in 1788.