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Someone threw a birthday party with several dozen guests before. When you are describing the guests, I think you can use these sentences:

Dozens of people came to his birthday party. Many of them were his friends.

My question is, when you want to write this in one sentence, which sentence can you use?

Dozens of people came to his birthday party, many of them his friends.

Dozens of people came to his birthday party, many of them being his friends.

I am not sure whether you should use "being" after "many of them." Can the word "being" be omitted?

Sanda
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    Yes, you can omit 'being'. – Kate Bunting Nov 19 '21 at 10:30
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    Compare Dozens of people came to his birthday party, many of them being uninvited. As with the exact version cited above, being** is optional. But personally, I'd much rather omit it in my version, even though I can't explain why I feel differently about the two contexts. Maybe it's a meaningless distinction, I dunno. – FumbleFingers Nov 19 '21 at 18:24

2 Answers2

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Your sentence sounds best with being omitted. Being as you have used it, is most often included to indicate a motive due to a relationship.

John's friends laugh when he falls into the manure -

John fell into the manure and his friends, Steve and Edith, had a good laugh.

Being John's friends, Steve and Edith treat an embarrassing situation with maturity -

John fell into the manure but Steve and Edith, being his friends, pulled him out and never spoke of it again.

My professor failed me -

My professor, Dr. Martin, gave me an F.

Being my professor, Dr. Martin instructs -

Dr. Martin gave me an F, but being my professor she explained where I was deficient.

EllieK
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Both of your proposed sentences are grammatically acceptable, but it's better to keep the word "being" in there if you have enough space. With this extra word included, it sounds less awkward and sounds more precise, which is very likely the reason why you came here to ask this in the first place. I agree with both the comments, but I'd leave the word "being" in there if it won't harm you in any other way.

One of the reasons why I don't like the sentence that doesn't contain the word "being" is because "many of them his friends" doesn't sound very good on its own, and I prefer to construct my sentences so that not only the full sentence sounds acceptable, but also so that each fragment sounds acceptable on its own (when and if this is practical to do).

Nike Dattani
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