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Are there grammatical errors in the following sentences? Semantically, one of them seems not right.

  1. Someone parked their cars at the entrance.
  2. The scientist dedicated themselves to the research.
user421993
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    (1) Singular 'their' can take a singular noun. 'Someone parked their car at the entrance' is likely. 'Someone parked their cars at the entrance.' is unlikely though possible: John parked all three of his cars at the entrance. Just to be awkward. // (2)'The scientist dedicated themself to the research' is feasible, but if the gender of the scientist is (as is likely) known, 'himself' or 'herself' should be used. The sentence sounds stilted and unusual. – Edwin Ashworth Apr 30 '21 at 18:55
  • @EdwinAshworth, Thanks for reminding me of more information.So, ‘The scientist dedicated him or herself to the research’ is more commonly acceptable? – user421993 Apr 30 '21 at 20:01
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    '‘The scientist dedicated him- / herself to the research’ sound fine. ‘The scientist dedicated themself to the research’ sounds awful. But 'A scientist who devotes themself to research is to be admired', which is generic rather than specific, is also acceptable. – Edwin Ashworth May 01 '21 at 13:44

1 Answers1

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To say if there is a semantic error, we would need to know what the intended meaning of the sentences is.

“Someone parked their cars at the entrance” is incorrect if it is meant to convey that there was a single car parked at the entrance, but correct if it is meant to express that multiple cars were parked at the entrance. A verb used with we, you, or they as the subject will be inflected to agree with the pronoun, but nouns are never inflected into the plural simply to show agreement with another word. “Their car” and “their cars” are both grammatical, but with different meanings.

“The scientist dedicated themselves to the research” is different because the “-selves” in “themselves” is not an independent noun, but just part of a pronoun. “Themselves” can be used to refer to a single person.

herisson
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