Grammar Girl here, today guest writer Bonnie Trango will help us talk about tricky sentences

that make you question whether you should use a singular or plural verb.

Today, we're talking about a tricky kind of sentence, but causes you to make a mistake

with subject verb agreement.

As we all learned in school, a singular subject agrees with a singular verb, and a plural

subject agrees with a plural verb.

Here's though, other parts of the sentence get in the way and confuse you.

Here's an example of the kind of sentence we're talking about.

The star attractions at the museum were the art, or should it be the star attractions

at the museum was the art.

Before we can answer the were or was question in the museum sentence, we need to define

the problem.

The source of the conundrum is what's called a distracting predicate noun.

A predicate is what provides information about the subject.

In the museum sentence, the predicate noun is the art, a singular word.

The subject is the star attractions, and that's plural.

So should the verb agree with the subject or the predicate noun?

Although this problem may seem complicated, it's really not.

It's as simple as this.

The verb agrees with the subject, not the predicate noun.

Therefore, were is correct in the museum sentence because the subject is the star attractions,

a plural noun.

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