MY MEDIA ENGLISH WATCH

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Semantic quandary over news about an income-earning crocodile

In these times when hard news is often packaged as infotainment while showbiz fluff is routinely presented as legitimate news, where do we draw the line between the kind of language used for reporting them? I ask this in the context of the following news story in the website of GMA News Online:

Frankly, I’m not very sure if the language of the above news report is semantically and logically acceptable. Was it Croc Lolong that made all that money, or was it the town of Bunawan that did by making the fearsome creature a pay-for-view show? If the latter is the case, shouldn’t that lead sentence be rewritten to give credit where credit is due?

I must admit that I’m stumped by this language conundrum, so I’ll greatly appreciate suggestions and comments from Forum members and guests.  

SHORT TAKES FROM MY MEDIA ENGLISH WATCH:

(1) Manila Bulletin: Dangling modifying phrase

The lead sentence above suffers from a dangling modifier. This is because the phrase “if proven that they are church property” is unable to link or associate itself with a subject that it can logically modify. That subject obviously can’t be the proper noun “Diocese of Malolos (Bulacan),” which it’s trying to modify in vain; after all, there’s really no need to prove that the diocese itself is church property. Logically, that subject could only be the noun phrase “the century-old bells recently returned by the United States to the Philippine government,” but it’s so far removed from this modifier for the modification to take place properly.

So how can we possibly effect the desired modification in that lead sentence?

One quick way is to make “the Diocese of Malolos” the logical subject of that modifying phrase. We can do this by rewording that phrase such that the diocese itself—in the form of the pronoun “it”—will be doing the proving, as follows:

“If it can prove that they are church property, the Diocese of Malolos (Bulacan) will seek ownership of the century-old bells recently returned by the United States to the Philippine government.”

Another way—and I think it’s functionally much better—is to introduce the modifying phrase with the preposition “by” to create the same sense intended by the above rewrite, as follows:

“By proving that they are church property, the Diocese of Malolos (Bulacan) plans to seek ownership of the century-old bells recently returned by the United States to the Philippine government.”

(2) GMA News Online: Wrong preposition, faulty logic

The misuse of the preposition “after” by the lead sentence above makes the statement false and illogical. If those 19 skin-lightening cosmetic products indeed contain high levels of mercury, then they have always been dangerous to health from the very start, not just after they were found to contain those high mercury levels.

This serious semantic problem disappears when that lead sentence is rewritten as follows:

“At least 19 skin-lightening cosmetic products have been found to have high levels of mercury and may pose danger to health, an ecological group said.”

(3) The Philippine Star: Wrong preposition usage

By definition, a “manhunt” is an organized and usually intensive hunt for—not against—a person and especially for one charged with a crime. Well, the headline of the above story—“Manhunt on for Ligots”—got it perfectly right but got it badly wrong in the lead sentence, which says that the Justice Secretary ordered a manhunt against the Ligot couple.

The grammar lesson here is, of course, that it pays to be consistent in one’s preposition usage. It certainly doesn’t make sense to be correct the first time and wrong right thereafter, for it gives the sense that the reporter or editor is just winging it with prepositions.

(4) Manila Bulletin: Subject-verb disagreement; misuse of the transitive verb “deplete”

Just an oversight perhaps, but the noun “resources” in the lead sentence above is obviously plural, so the operative verb should be in the plural form “are fast depleting” and not the singular “is fast depleting.”

But an even more serious error in that lead sentence is its misuse of “deplete” as an intransitive verb. Being transitive, “deplete” always needs a doer of the action and a direct object to work properly. In other words, something doesn’t just deplete but is depleted by some agent or agency.

That lead sentence should therefore be grammatically corrected as follows:

“Noting that the province’s quarry resources is fast being depleted, a member of the provincial board has sought that Tarlac be compensated properly for its natural resources.”

In the above passive-voice construction, of course, the agent or agency responsible for depleting the quarry resources is not mentioned but presumed. But the transitive character of the verb “deplete” becomes clear when that sentence is constructed in the active voice:

“Noting that Tarlac is being fast depleted of its quarry resources, a member of the provincial board has sought that the province be compensated properly for them.”

Lastly, I must admit that I really couldn’t make heads and tails of the sense and logic of the second paragraph of that story’s lead passage. For that reason, I wouldn’t even attempt a rewrite here.

(5) GMA News Online: Faulty grammar and semantics

From the lead summary of a major special report:

The modifying phrase “some of them while captured” is semantically faulty because it wrongly uses the prepositional phrase “while captured.” Getting captured takes place only as a fleeting event in time; captivity is the outcome that has duration. Thus, to say that some of the soldiers met brutal deaths “while captured” doesn’t make logical sense; the grammatically and semantically correct way to say it is that some of the soldiers were “killed while in captivity,” as follows:

“Despite the recent brutal deaths of soldiers in Basilan, some of them killed while in captivity, President Aquino has chosen to continue peace talks with the MILF.”

(6) Philippine Star: Subject-verb disagreement

Just a proofreading oversight perhaps, but I found it odd that “a ranking leader” has been treated as plural in the above lead sentence. The word “leader” is, of course,  a collective noun that’s unquestionably grammatically singular, so that sentence needs to be corrected as follows:

“A ranking leader of the New People’s Army (NPA) was reportedly among the four fatalities in last Thursday’s encounter with government troops in a remote Cagayan village.”

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