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why the third person singular has no tense here?
I met the sentence on our university's website. "A student posted a 'Babysitter Available' ad, and received an offer to become employed by an idividual on the condition the student open a Bank of America bank account and provide the account information." Noticed "open" and "provide" have no -s or -ed here, I am confused. Are they supposed to go with " the student"? Thank you.
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Re: why the third person singular has no tense here?

Originally Posted by
reginaregina
I met the sentence on our university's website. "A student posted a 'Babysitter Available' ad, and received an offer to become employed by an idividual on the condition the student open a Bank of America bank account and provide the account information." Noticed "open" and "provide" have no -s or -ed here, I am confused. Are they supposed to go with " the student"? Thank you.
"The student should open a Bank of America bank account and provide the account information." If it was written like this it is correct.
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Re: why the third person singular has no tense here?

Originally Posted by
bhaisahab
"The student should open a Bank of America bank account and provide the account information." If it was written like this it is correct.

I'd like to disagree. The hiring person is not suggesting that the student "should" do anything. He is mandating that the student do something, or not get the job. It's subjunctive. Of course, it could have been written as above, but it wasn't.
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Re: why the third person singular has no tense here?

Originally Posted by
Raymott
I'd like to disagree. The hiring person is not suggesting that the student "should" do anything. He is mandating that the student do something, or not get the job. It's subjunctive. Of course, it could have been written as above, but it wasn't.
Well obviously, if they want the job they should... if not then they should not.
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Re: why the third person singular has no tense here?

Originally Posted by
bhaisahab
Well obviously, if they want the job they
should... if not then they
should not.
Of course, but I think students need to be able to recognise the subjunctive even if they never use it - especially in this form where it does make a difference to the meaning (as opposed to the "If she was / If she were", which doesn't).
There is a semantic difference - in many English dialects still - between:
The appeals court agreed that the man should be hanged (which most people believed already).
The appeals court agreed that the man be hanged (which is worse news for the man than the above).
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