The audience was amazed, ____________?

[spica]

there's been a huge debate among teachers in my language centre regarding the appropriate tag question for

The audience was amazed, __________?

personally, i think the answer should be

weren't they?

.

what do you think?
some teachers said it's supposed to be "wasn't it" or "wasn't he."
i guess we really need some help here, and if you could also please post your reference, it would be much more helpful.

thanks..^^

[Soup]

No reference required. The tag mirrors the subject-verb pair in the main clause:

Concordance
The audience was amazed, wasn't it?
The audience were amazed, weren't they?

Elipsis (...)
The audience was amazed (the people I mean), weren't they?

[iconoclast]

Since 'audience' is a collective noun, then it may take a plural verb, in British English at least, which would give us: "The audience were amazed, weren't they?".

[Anglika]

As Soup points out, it can take either.

[spica]

thanks for that. i think it depends also on the country the speaker is from. canadian, british and american english differ in many ways.
anyway, we've got it settled already.
thanks really.