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Greatly influenced by the Protested missionary Samuel Kirkland, the On 23 Jan 2021, 03:49
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sayantanc2k
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Why is D wrong here?
People are writing that because of S-V agreement, were shouldn't have been used.

But the Onida, is a plural construction such as the English or the French, so "were" seems alright. Apart from that, it uses a better idiom, only one of the 5 nations..So not really understanding the issue with D. Can someone help explain?

In option D, Oneida is the name of a nation (e.g. England or France): it is one "out of the five nations". The part "out of the five nations" makes it clear that Oneida is not the people of a country (e.g. English or French) as you interpreted. Therefore "were" is wrong.
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Hello!
I have a doubt regarding the use of who? Can who be used to modify the subject of the sentence? because in this question I thought Who to modify the Oneida.
Thanks
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Greatly influenced by the Protested missionary Samuel Kirkland, the On Updated on: 06 Sep 2021, 02:24
Originally posted by pk6969 on 23 Jan 2021, 03:50.
Last edited by pk6969 on 06 Sep 2021, 02:24, edited 1 time in total.
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Greatly influenced by the Protestant missionary Samuel Kirkland, the Oneida was the only one of the five-nation Iroquois League who sided with the colonists during the American Revolution.


(A) was the only one of the five-nation Iroquois League who sided

(B) was alone of the five-nation Iroquois League when they sided

(C) alone among the five-nation Iroquois League sided

(D) were the only ones out of the five nations of Iroquois League in siding

(E) only of the five-nation Iroquois League had sided

This question is based on Pronouns, Usage, and Construction.

In Option A, the pronoun ‘who’ is ambiguous; the pronoun ‘who’ cannot refer to “the Oneida”, which seems to be part of the five-nation Iroquois League, and therefore, must be a nation or tribe. So, Option A can be eliminated.

Option B contains an error of idiomatic usage – alone of. The appropriate expression is “alone among”.
This option also contains an error of pronoun usage – the plural pronoun ‘they’ cannot refer to the singular antecedent “the Oneida”.
The relative adverb “when” is also inappropriate as it refers to a specific time. So, Option B can be eliminated.

Option D contains a subject-verb disagreement; the plural subject ‘were’ does not agree with the singular subject “the Oneida”.
The phrase “in siding” is also inappropriate; the appropriate expression would have been “to side”. So, Option D can be eliminated.

In Option E, the past perfect tense is inappropriate. The past perfect tense is used to convey an earlier action in the past. Since there is no later action in the past, the usage of this tense is inappropriate.
Furthermore, the adverb ‘only’ cannot be used by itself to convey the meaning that the Oneida was the only one to side with the colonists. The appropriate expression is "the only one". So, Option E can be eliminated.

The adjective ‘alone’ describes “the Oneida” and conveys the intended meaning that only the Oneida sided with the colonists.
The verb ‘side’ is in the simple past tense, which is appropriate to convey the idea that the action took place at an indefinite time in the past. Therefore, C is the most appropriate option.

Jayanthi Kumar.
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Greatly influenced by the Protested missionary Samuel Kirkland, the On 24 Jan 2021, 04:14
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pk6969
Hello!
I have a doubt regarding the use of who? Can who be used to modify the subject of the sentence? because in this question I thought Who to modify the Oneida.
Thanks
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Hi pk6969, in option A:

(i) If we consider the Oneida as multiple people (like the Indians), then the verb was is incorrect (it should have been were)

(ii) If we consider the Oneida as a nation (from the context of the sentence), then the usage of who is incorrect, since who can only modify people and not nations.

So, either way, A is incorrect.

p.s. Note that interpretation (ii) seems slightly untenable to me because the sentence uses "the Oneida". Generally we don't use the with a nation's name (for example, "the India" is not appropriate usage).
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Greatly influenced by the Protestant missionary Samuel Kirkland, the Oneida was the only one of the five-nation Iroquois League who sided with the colonists during the American Revolution.


(A) was the only one of the five-nation Iroquois League who sided

(B) was alone of the five-nation Iroquois League when they sided

(C) alone among the five-nation Iroquois League sided

(D) were the only ones out of the five nations of Iroquois League in siding

(E) only of the five-nation Iroquois League had sided


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Academic American Encyclopedia, Volume 14
Front Cover
Grolier, 1982 - Encyclopedias and dictionaries

Attachment:
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Hello! Whoa, got stumped by this question. I found none of the answer choices correct. In C I saw sided as a modifier modifying league and not as verb. I mean it creates such ambiguity and gmat answers are never ambiguous. Please help where I am going wrong. IanStewart
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MartyTargetTestPrep I have read somewhere that The Oneida, The Mayans, The French etc. are considered plural. However, as per daagh sir's explanation, they are singular. Pls clarify whether my understanding is correct. Thanks!
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MartyTargetTestPrep I have read somewhere that The Oneida, The Mayans, The French etc. are considered plural. However, as per daagh sir's explanation, they are singular. Pls clarify whether my understanding is correct. Thanks!
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Your understanding is correct.

That said, in this case, in some sentence versions, it appears that "the Oneida" could possibly be read as short for "the Oneida Nation."

That way of using "the Oneida" isn't great, and what exactly is going on with any version of this sentence, even the "correct" version, is not 100 percent clear, but maybe Daagh was picking up on that possible reading when he said what he said.
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Hi Experts

GMATNinja KarishmaB MartyTargetTestPrep


Greatly influenced by the Protestant missionary Samuel Kirkland, the Oneida was the only one of the five-nation Iroquois League who sided with the colonists during the American Revolution.


(A) was the only one of the five-nation Iroquois League who sided

(B) was alone of the five-nation Iroquois League when they sided

(C) alone among the five-nation Iroquois League sided

(D) were the only ones out of the five nations of Iroquois League in siding

(E) only of the five-nation Iroquois League had sided

Don't we need helping verb with "Sided" in option C

I was not knowing the meaning of "Sided" So I was not sure if I can act as a verb or as a modifier. Can you please tell me how can I figure out if "Sided" is acting as a verb or a modifier?
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Greatly influenced by the Protested missionary Samuel Kirkland, the On 31 Mar 2023, 22:18
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Vatsal7794

It definitely helps to know the word, but we can also use context. When we see "who sided" or "they sided," that word can only be a verb. I can't say "My dog who tired went to sleep" or "My friend was traveling when she considered for the Nobel Prize." The placement forces a verb, so we can know for sure it's not meant to be a modifier.
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Please guys, option D is incorrect but for some other reason and not because the use of 'were'. The use of were is correct here, since The Oneida is a community. Just like we use: The French are good people. Here we are describing a community, which is plural.
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I don't understand the issue of the Subject-Verb of answer D. Why is that Oneida is singular and not plural?
From my understanding of the text, Oneida are a faction and not a single person, therefore should be plural.

In my head, the reasoning goes: "The Portuguese are; The English are; The Oneida are;". Could someone explain what is wrong with my reasoning? I still agree with answer C though
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Yeah, it's a mistake to eliminate D because of "were." There's no reason for a reader to assume that the name of a group of people should be used as a singular. D has other troubles, and C nicely sidesteps the singular/plural issue, so there's no official support for the singular version.
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In a general question like this coming up, it is almost impossible to know that The Oneida is a nation. In such a case, if we are removing 'who' with the logic that the term is used to refer to people only, then this can be tricky.
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Greatly influenced by the Protestant missionary Samuel Kirkland, the Oneida was the only one of the five-nation Iroquois League who sided with the colonists during the American Revolution.

Option Elimination - In this case, "the Oneida" refers to the tribe (or one of 5 nations in the Iroquois league) and is singular. One more example: The Oneida is a Native American tribe in New York. BUT "the Oneida" can be plural as well if it refers to the group's individual members. E.g., The Oneida are known for their long-standing cultures and traditions. So, if you see "The Oneida," it's not always singular. We need to look at the context.

One more point aligned with this.
When "The Oneida" refers to a group or a tribe - we can't use "who" as "who" has to be used with living beings. E.g., The Oneida tribe, which has a rich cultural heritage, continues to celebrate its traditions. BUT
When "The Oneida" refers to individual group members, "who" is okay. E.g., The Oneida, who have a rich cultural heritage, continue to celebrate their traditions.

So, decide based on the context of the sentence. In this GMAT sentence, "The Oneida" refers to the tribe (as we talk about one amongst the five-nation Iroquois League), so "who" is not ok.

Moreover, "influenced" is an "ed" verbal modifying the subject "The Oneida."

(A) was the only one of the five-nation Iroquois League who sided - "who" wrong.

(B) was alone of the five-nation Iroquois League when they sided - "they"? Wrong.

(C) alone among the five-nation Iroquois League sided - ok.

(D) were the only ones out of the five nations of Iroquois League in siding - "were"? Wrong
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Greatly influenced by the Protested missionary Samuel Kirkland, the On 20 Nov 2023, 09:39
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Apeksha2101
Please guys, option D is incorrect but for some other reason and not because the use of 'were'. The use of were is correct here, since The Oneida is a community. Just like we use: The French are good people. Here we are describing a community, which is plural.
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PTD1995
I don't understand the issue of the Subject-Verb of answer D. Why is that Oneida is singular and not plural?

From my understanding of the text, Oneida are a faction and not a single person, therefore should be plural.

In my head, the reasoning goes: "The Portuguese are; The English are; The Oneida are;". Could someone explain what is wrong with my reasoning? I still agree with answer C though
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Sorry that I'm late to the party here! In case it helps anybody: the key is the "out of the five nations" part. From the context, we know that we're talking about five different nations and that "the Oneida" must represent ONE of those five nations.

We'd use "were" and "ones" if more than one of those nations sided with the colonists (e.g. "The Oneida and the Mohawks WERE the only ONES...". But since only one nation sided with the colonists, "were" isn't appropriate.

Also, if we were referring to "the Oneida" as a community/collection of people, then why use "in siding" instead of "who sided"? "The Oneida were alone in siding with the colonists" might work, but the prepositional phrase "in siding" doesn't make much sense as written in (D).

(C) gives us: "The Oneida alone {...} sided with the colonists". This is a much simpler and clearer construction, and that makes (C) a better choice.

I hope that helps a bit!
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