XP: were or was?

originally posted by Cliff:
Unless he were to use the subjunctive.
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My statement was sloppy but the verdict is correct: No 'that', no 'should', no 'had' == no subjunctive.

If you like, I'll edit to indicate that PC's sentence is in the indicative mood.
 
not at all clear. PC was quoting from Oswaldo i think; O might have been invoking subjunctive mood (condition contrary to fact) or even plain conditional in English. but yes; if the original was purely narrative, indicative would be right, and then "was".
 
PC excerpted Da Other Prof: "I only will note that if Barthes is right, no wine's evaluation (or, God help us, it's interpretation) could be governed by the intentions of its winemaker, regardless of how interventionist or non-interventionist he or she were."

Doesn't look subjunctive to me. He spoke of the winemaker, not the intentions. Nothing counter-factual or unrealistic or speculative.
 
The sentence is conditional with regard to a hypothetical winemaker-regardless of how--and therefore does take the subjunctive. It does not refer to the intentions of a particular winemaker.
 
originally posted by Keith Levenberg:
Of course the most glaring problem with this sentence is the gratuitous "or she."
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Really? So, you are unaware of any female winemakers? Or, perhaps, like
my students, you prefer switching from singular to plural to use a gender neutral pronoun.
 
Neither, Professor. Switching from singular to plural in a cowardly attempt to avoid the controversy is mildly preferable to the grating "or she," but it is also unnecessary. See Strunk & White p. 60 ("The use of 'he' as a pronoun embracing both genders is a simple and practical convention rooted in the beginnings of the English language. 'He' has lost all suggestion of maleness in these circumstances."). The argument that the use of the pronoun "he" excludes all female winemakers in that context is conclusively proven untrue by the fact that the P.C. police accepts the use of the word "she" *without* the "he" as a pronoun embracing both genders; if the word "she" can do that job, then the word "he" can do so as well, and carries the added benefit of being used for that purpose for far longer. Humorously, in my law journal days the unwritten but almost universally practiced rule was that "he or she" or "she" standing alone was to be used in virtually all situations, unless the population being referred to had any type of social or professional prestige (doctors, judges, etc.), in which case "she" standing alone was *always* used to the point of rewriting sentences in awkward and acrobatic fashion just to give the writer an excuse to announce to the world that he naturally assumes that any doctor or judge (or, in one case, any president of the United States) is a "she." (I would not be remotely surprised to learn the culprit in the presidential case managed to attain tenure on the basis of that sentence and nothing more.) However, there was one interesting exception to the "she" rule. "He" standing alone was always used to refer to a murderer, rapist, domestic abuser, or child molester.
 
originally posted by Keith Levenberg:
Humorously, in my law journal days the unwritten but almost universally practiced rule was that "he or she" or "she" standing alone was to be used in virtually all situations, unless the population being referred to had any type of social or professional prestige (doctors, judges, etc.), in which case "she" standing alone was *always* used to the point of rewriting sentences in awkward and acrobatic fashion just to give the writer an excuse to announce to the world that he naturally assumes that any doctor or judge (or, in one case, any president of the United States) is a "she." (I would not be remotely surprised to learn the culprit in the presidential case managed to attain tenure on the basis of that sentence and nothing more.) However, there was one interesting exception to the "she" rule. "He" standing alone was always used to refer to a murderer, rapist, domestic abuser, or child molester.
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Can we get a cite?
 
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