Pronouns

“meet” vs. “meet with” vs. “meet up with”

Pronouns, Verbs, Versus

I started to think about this comparison after hearing someone say “meet up with” a couple of days ago.

Problem:
Only two of these three are proper English.

Explanation:
I recently heard someone on the radio say “I was going to meet up with Chris in Galveston.”

This sentence contains an unnecessary preposition. The expression “meet up with” means exactly what “meet with” means but contains the unnecessary preposition “up” and therefore is not proper English.

In contrast, “meet with” is proper English but does not mean what “meet” means.

  • If I “meet John”, then he and I interact with one another for the first time.
  • If I “meet with John”, then he and I already know one another and are having another meeting together.

Solution:
Use “meet” for an initial, introductory meeting between two parties. Use “meet with” for subsequent meetings between two parties. Avoid “meet up with”.

“They are the people which pay the bill.”

Pronouns

I read this somewhere recently.

Problem:
The sentence uses the wrong relative pronoun.

Explanation:
The word “which” — spelled W-H-I-C-H — can be used as a relative pronoun to represent a specified antecedent.

Here are two examples of the correct use of “which” as as relative pronoun:

  • In a nonrestrictive clause: “The movie, which I saw last night, was boring.”
  • In a restrictive clause: “The religion which John preached was unacceptable to many.”

The problem with “which” as a relative pronoun in “They are the people which pay the bill.” is that “which” is supposed to refer to inanimate objects and to animals but not to humans.

The correct relative pronoun for referring to humans is “who”. This gives us the solution.

Solution:
“They are the people who pay the bill.”

“Those ones …”

Common English Blunders, Plurals, Pronouns

I heard this from someone the other day.

Problem:
The word “ones” is unnecessary in this phrase.

Explanation:
The individual said a sentence such as “Those ones are bigger.”

The word “those” in the phrase “Those ones …” is acting as a determiner.

Other examples of “those” as a determiner include:

  • “I like those chocolates.”
  • “Do you want those tickets?”
  • “He should give her those flowers.”

Also, it is possible to pluralize the singular numerical pronoun “one”, as in the following examples:

  • “I like the vanilla ones.”
  • “The ones in green are tickets for the front row.”
  • “Are the pink flowers the ones that he wants?”

However, when the word “ones” is preceded by a plural determiner (such as “those”), it is best to drop the word “ones”, thereby converting the determiner “these” into a demonstrative pronoun, as shown in the following examples:

  • “I like those.”
  • “Do you want those?”
  • “He should give her those.”

Solution:
“Those …”