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News stories must give no room to irrelevant rhetorical flourishes

The major stories of the four major Metro Manila broadsheets were admirably free of serious English grammar errors in their past two issues (August 6 and 7). All I found in their pages that I think are instructive enough to be critiqued in the Forum are the following language and grammar problems:

(1) Philippine Star: Use of illogical, unrelated imagery; faulty reporting

1. Use of illogical, unrelated imagery: In the first sentence of the lead passage above, the use of the modifying phrase “amid the exodus of Philippine Airlines pilots” is unwarranted, irrelevant, and illogical. The sensationalist imagery dangerously implies that the “exodus of Philippine Airlines pilots” had in some unspecified way made that accident happen; it even falsely hints that there was a mass movement of pilots at the Loakan Airport at the precise time of the crash. But there’s actually no logical or circumstantial correlation whatsoever between the crash of the trainer airplane and that “exodus,” so that phrase has absolutely no business being in that news story. There should be no room in news reporting for misleading rhetorical flourishes like that.
2. Faulty reporting: In the third paragraph of the lead passage, it is reported that “the landing gear of the Cessna plane…had allegedly overshot the runway that caused the aircraft to turn upside down at around 9:27 a.m.” This is a logical impossibility that could only be the result of faulty reporting. For unless that landing gear had detached itself from the plane, it couldn’t have overshot the runway without the rest of the aircraft itself, much less could it have caused the aircraft to turn upside down. It’s evident here that it was the aircraft itself—with its landing gear still intact—that overshot the runway 

So here’s a rewrite of that problematic passage that fixes those illogical aspects of its narrative:

“A student pilot and his instructor were injured yesterday morning when a two-seater Cessna 152 trainer airplane crashed while landing at the Loakan Airport here.

“The pilot of the plane Captain Glen Pedraja and student pilot Paul Burns suffered minor injuries and were treated at the Philippine Military Academy Hospital.

“Police Inspector Carolina Desiderio, station chief of the PNP Aviation Security Group at the Loakan Airport said the Cessna plane with tail number RPC 8864 and owned by Omni Aviation Flying School based in Clark Field, Pampanga, had overshot the runway and turned upside down at around 9:27 a.m.”

(2) Manila Bulletin: Faulty construction of a relative “that”-clause

The grammatically correct format for a sentence with a subordinate “that”-clause is this: [main clause] + that + [subject of relative clause + operative verb + complement]. Of course, a subordinate “that”-clause without an operative verb can’t function as a noun clause; it becomes a sentence fragment instead.

In the case of the lead sentence above, the clause “that government’s royalties from the Malampaya deep water-to-gas project field to reach P18.37 billion this year and in 2011” isn’t a legitimate subordinate clause because it has no operative verb at all. Instead of a verb, it incorrectly uses the prepositional phrase “to reach P18.37 billion this year and in 2011.” Grammatically, of course, a prepositional phrase functions not as a verb but as a modifier, so the construction of that subordinate clause is wrong.

For the “that”-clause to function correctly in that sentence, the infinitive “to reach” needs to be replaced by the verb form “would reach,” so the sentence would read as follows:

“The Department of Finance (DoF) is expecting that government’s royalties from the Malampaya deep water-to-gas project field would reach P18.37 billion this year and in 2011.”

Another way to construct that sentence correctly is to simply get rid of the subordinating conjunction “that” (in fact, I suspect that this was what the writer intended to do in the first place until he or she got sidetracked into creating a faulty “that” subordinate clause):  

“The Department of Finance (DoF) is expecting government’s royalties from the Malampaya deep water-to-gas project field to reach P18.37 billion this year and in 2011.”

In this construction, the noun phrase “government’s royalties from the Malampaya deep water-to-gas project field” becomes the direct object of the verb “expecting,” and the prepositional phrase “to reach P18.37 billion this year and in 2011” functions as a modifier of that direct object.

(3) Manila Bulletin: Subject-verb disagreement error; convoluted, faulty phrasing

1. Subject-verb disagreement error: In the first sentence of the lead passage above, the main clause “the slow but steady growth of swine, poultry and aquaculture sectors have enabled stakeholders” exhibits a classic case of a subject-verb agreement error. The true operative doer of the action in that clause is the noun phrase “the slow but steady growth of swine, poultry and aquaculture sectors,” and its operative noun is the singular noun “growth,” so the verb should be in the singular form “has enabled,” not the plural form “have enabled.” In a great many cases, this kind of subject-verb disagreement error happens because the writer mistakes the noun nearest the operative verb—in this case the plural “sectors”—as the referent noun.
   
   To avoid this kind of subject-verb disagreement error, the writer needs to first analyze a noun phrase carefully to determine which of its nouns acts as its true subject or doer of the action. Only then will the writer be able to determine  whether that subject or doer of the action is singular or plural—a determination that, of course, would dictate whether the verb should take the singular or plural form.

2. Convoluted, faulty phrasing: Also in the first sentence, the phrase “in order to raise socio-economic viability and meet the increasing demands for agricultural products” doesn’t link properly with the preceding part of the sentence. The phrase “in order to” isn’t able to provide a logical linkage; in fact, it’s not even necessary to use it in that sentence. Also, the use of the plural form “demands” is semantically improper; it should be the singular “demand” instead.

Here’s a suggested rewrite of that problematic sentence taking the above considerations into account:

The slow but steady growth of the swine, poultry and aquaculture sectors has enabled stakeholders to expand agricultural operations, thus raising their socio-economic viability and their ability to meet the increasing demand for agricultural products.”

(4) Manila Bulletin: Improper use of the comparative “less”; improper use of the plural “potentials”

1. Improper use of the comparative “less”: In the first sentence of the lead passage above, the use of the comparative “less” is grammatically wrong; it should be “fewer” instead. The comparative “less” is used as a comparative for singular mass nouns, or things that use “amount” as a measure; thus, we say, “We consumed less water this month than last month,” “Our factories should consume less energy to remain competitive.” In the sentence in question, however, the subject “sheep raisers in the Philippines” is a plural count noun, or things that use “number” as measure; in such cases, “fewer” is the correct comparative instead of “less,” as in “There are fewer candidates for club president this year” and “We find fewer job openings in the classified ads these days.”
2. Improper use of the plural potentials: In the second sentence of the lead passage above, the plural noun “potentials” is improperly used; the generally accepted usage in this sentence construction is the singular “potential” instead.

So here’s that problematic passage as corrected:

“Sheep raisers in the Philippines are much fewer than goat raisers. That’s probably because most Filipinos have been used to eating goat rather than sheep. But there is an increasing awareness of the potential of sheep production as a possible money-maker for local farmers.”

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