"Unrest Spreads, Some Violently"

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Neil MacFarquhar, "Unrest Spreads, Some Violently, in Middle East", NYT 2/17/2011:

From northern Africa to the Persian Gulf, governments appeared to flounder over just how to outrun mostly peaceful movements, spreading erratically like lava erupting from a volcano, with no predictable end.

The protests convulsed countries across the Middle East on Thursday , with riot police launching a sudden crackdown on thousands of people challenging the monarchy in Bahrain, firing shot guns, tear gas and concussion grenades into a tent camp to send demonstrators fleeing under clouds of stinging fumes. At least five people were reported killed.


Meanwhile, this story's headline spread its own small region of uncertainty: Geoff Nunberg thinks that it's ungrammatical, but others disagree, some emphatically.  I sympathize with both sides, and await clarification from my syntactically and semantically better-informed colleagues.

Here's the obligatory screenshot:

[I shouldn't need to point out that events in Bahrain, Yemen and elsewhere are serious and consequential, while this issue is not.]



43 Comments

  1. Sid Smith said,

    February 17, 2011 @ 7:02 pm

    "Unrest Spreads, Some Violently, in Middle East"

    Seems ok. After all, you can say "Some unrest spreads violently in Middle East".

  2. John Cowan said,

    February 17, 2011 @ 7:02 pm

    For me, some can only be elliptical for some of them, not for some of it which is what this headline demands.

    While I'm at it, reported killed in the last line of the quotation is also ungrammatical for me, though I certainly recognize it: I'd have to say reported as killed or (with an inward shudder) reportedly killed. I suspect that it's a hypercorrection for the latter.

  3. Jerry Friedman said,

    February 17, 2011 @ 7:04 pm

    While you're waiting, I say the headline doesn't work because it suggests that some unrest is spreading violently, when the author must mean that some of the spreading unrest is violent. (I don't think violently can be a figure of speech for suddenly or anything like that.)

  4. Sid Smith said,

    February 17, 2011 @ 7:07 pm

    Expanding on the above…

    OK grammar, I think, but the meaning is off. I don't suppose the Times's headline writer actually wanted to say that the unrest is spreading violently: s/he surely meant "Unrest, some of it violent, spreads in Middle East".

  5. jfruh said,

    February 17, 2011 @ 7:09 pm

    Agree w/Jerry Friedman above. Were I on the NYT copy desk, I'd amend to "Unrest, Some Of It Violent, Spreads Across Middle East", assuming it's just for the Web. (The elliptical original headline may have been for a narrow print column.)

  6. Peter said,

    February 17, 2011 @ 7:12 pm

    I take it the claimed ungrammaticality is in the use of “some” with a non-plural noun?

    Grammatical errors enrage me, some violently.
    Prescriptivism enrages me, sometimes violently.
    Some prescriptivism enrages me violently.
    *Prescriptivism enrages me, some violently.

  7. Peter said,

    February 17, 2011 @ 7:13 pm

    er, I clearly meant “…the use of ‘some’ with a non-plural noun in this sort of inversion”. Or something.

  8. John Roth said,

    February 17, 2011 @ 7:17 pm

    I've come to think there's a map-territory confusion here: whether it's ungrammatical depends on the grammar (map) one is using. For me personally (sample of territory) it's definitely a "huh, what" moment that required looking at it to divine what the headline writer meant.

  9. Mr Punch said,

    February 17, 2011 @ 7:19 pm

    [Some] unrest spreads [violently] – "some" modifies the noun, "violently" modifies the verb. The "some violently" can't be right, can it? How would one characterize the phrase?

    [(myl) As I understand it, the analysis would be "Unrest spreads, [and] some [unrest spreads] violently". One objection may be that it's the unrest or (more commonly) the governments' response to it that's sometimes violent, not the spreading. But some people seem to feel a deeper uneasiness about the ellipsis in this case.]

  10. Twitter Trackbacks for Language Log » “Unrest Spreads, Some Violently” [upenn.edu] on Topsy.com said,

    February 17, 2011 @ 7:33 pm

    […] Language Log » “Unrest Spreads, Some Violently” languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=2975 – view page – cached Neil MacFarquhar, "Unrest Spreads, Some Violently, in Middle East", NYT Tags […]

  11. maidhc said,

    February 17, 2011 @ 7:40 pm

    I have a hard time accepting "X, some Y" unless X is countable and plural. If X is non-count and singular, it doesn't change "some" into "some of it" in my mental model.

    "Seawater, some polluted with diesel fuel, surged through the gap" doesn't sound right to me.

    Lava doesn't spread erratically. Its flow is mostly determined by gravity and temperature, I believe.

    "Flounder" basically means to flap about like a fish, so floundering over outrunning paints a confusing picture.

    Governments are not trying to outrun protesters, they are trying to stop them from protesting.

    I believe that headlines are not usually written by the author of the article, so there are two places where some better editing would have been helpful: the article and the headline.

  12. Dw said,

    February 17, 2011 @ 8:10 pm

    "Butter spread, some violently, on toast"

  13. J. Goard said,

    February 17, 2011 @ 8:24 pm

    Well, there are only two relevant COCA hits for some very *.[rr] (general adverb), both with count nouns:

    It exploded that night after Waters' departure, wounding 22 men, some very seriously.

    Now the Republicans are dominant in all of those areas, some very closely

    Browsing examples with adjectives, they all seem to be count as well.

  14. Mark Mandel said,

    February 17, 2011 @ 8:45 pm

    maidhc said
    I have a hard time accepting "X, some Y" unless X is countable and plural. If X is non-count and singular, it doesn't change "some" into "some of it" in my mental model. "Seawater, some polluted with diesel fuel, surged through the gap" doesn't sound right to me.

    I agree about that example. But consider "Seawater, some polluted with diesel fuel, has been blown to the tops of many shoreline cliffs"? For me, your example sounds wrong because it's about a single mass of seawater, where pollution physically can't be limited to "some". Where there are separate masses, the "some" can be read as referring to some of these distinct and countable units. At least for me, that implicit countification licenses the "some".

    I have trouble accepting the headline because the metaphorical base of "violence spreads" is something like seawater or molasses, which doesn't spread in separable units, even though the "spread" of violence referred to here is not contiguous. (There's something wrong with that last clause, but I'll leave it.)

  15. GeorgeW said,

    February 17, 2011 @ 8:46 pm

    myl: "One objection may be that it's the unrest or (more commonly) the governments' response to it that's sometimes violent, not the spreading."

    That would be my objection – it is the response that is violent, not the spreading unrest.

  16. Chandra said,

    February 17, 2011 @ 8:49 pm

    I don't have a problem with "some" being elliptical for a non-count. (Ex.: "I spilled the milk, and some got on my shoes.") In my opinion, the weirdity in this headline comes not so much from the fact that "unrest" is non-countable, but that I somehow don't think of it as [i]dividable[/i].

  17. Chandra said,

    February 17, 2011 @ 8:51 pm

    Oops. Those should have been HTML brackets.

  18. Rubrick said,

    February 17, 2011 @ 10:19 pm

    I'm neither a colleague nor syntactically and semantically better-informed, but after chasing a number of red herrings, I've come up with an analysis that I like.

    First, some of the red herrings:

    1. "Unrest" is a singular mass noun and doesn't work in this construction with "some" (maidhc's objection). But to my ear "Naked flesh, some decaying, is everywhere in this video game" sounds fine.

    2. Perhaps there's a problem with "some" being separated from "unrest", or with "spreads" being separated from "violently"; or maybe with the interleaving of the two constructions (ABAB). But all these theories are refuted by the perfectly grammatical "Citizens Revolt, Some Violently".

    After chewing on this for a while, I hit on a the following theory. Consider the following two sentences:

    1. Unrest spreads, some violently.
    2. Protests spread, some violently.

    #2 seems entirely grammatical; but the only difference from #1 (our original example) is that "protests" is a true plural, taking the plural verb "spread", whereas "unrest" is a singulare tantum and thus takes the singular "spreads". My theory is that it's the juxtaposition of "spreads" and "some" that is causing the trouble.

    However, it's obviously fine for "some" to modify a singular mass noun like "unrest" just as well as a plural count noun like "protests"; so my conclusion seems to be that the original headline sounds ungrammatical but isn't. This is a bit peculiar.

    I guess my real conclusion is that the semantics of mass nouns (and plural names labeling singular entities, except they're not, e.g. The Beatles) are horribly messy.

  19. bfgray said,

    February 17, 2011 @ 10:56 pm

    @Dw

    Re: "Butter spread, some violently, on toast"

    You've cheated by making your example passive!

    Should be "Butter spreads, some violently, on toast". How does that sound?

  20. John said,

    February 17, 2011 @ 11:36 pm

    Rubrick has it, I think: mass nouns are messy.

    "Unrest spreads" marks the noun as singular and somehow , but "some -ly" needs a plural. Start with "Some unrest" and you're fine, or have "Unrest spreads, some of it…"

  21. Erik Zyman Carrasco said,

    February 18, 2011 @ 1:00 am

    My immediate reaction was the by now familiar one of finding it hard to take some in this sort of configuration as meaning ‘some of it’ rather than ‘some of them’. I'm not sure whether I can force the first reading, but it's clearly difficult, so I perceived the headline as unacceptable. And I didn't find any of the grammatically analogous examples that people have constructed in the comments fully acceptable either. (My judgments are usually sharp, but this one is rapidly becoming hazy for some reason….)

    The notion that unrest isn't easily divisible may have something to it. Unrest spread in the Middle East, and some of it did so violently avoids the main problem, but the partitive structure (some of it) strikes me as metaphorical-sounding, like you have a 3D representation of the unrest and you're ripping off a chunk of it.

  22. John Walden said,

    February 18, 2011 @ 3:03 am

    "All new housing should be energy efficient, unfortunately some isn't. "

    I don't think "some" is the issue. The unrest is spreading, sometimes accompanied with violence. One thing is that it is violent and another is how fast it spreads. These two are all mixed up in the headline. I would find

    Unrest, some violent, spreads rapidly in Middle East

    unremarkable. But then we Brits have to unravel headlines every day.

  23. michael farris said,

    February 18, 2011 @ 4:08 am

    I think this headline is a mini-perfect storm of a couple things that are okay on their own but which end up being unacceptable together.

    'some', as used here can only refer to either a subset of a group or possibly a quantity separable from a mass (as Chandra pointed out) and neither inerpretation works here as written.

    There's also the factor that the unrest is not a single event but a number of separate (though related) events. But grammatically unrest is non-count and requires some kind of counter before you can turn it into a plural or detached quantity.

    "Instances of violence spread, some violently" is basically okay though the semantics are still off, maybe because 'violently' works better with an animate subject.

    My best guess is that the headline was originally something like: "Unrest spreads, some of it violent, in Middle East" but was considered too long or not 'active' enough ( journalism students get lectured to a _lot_ about making their writing 'active') and the actual headline is the result of quick, haphazard editing.

    My suggested rewrite would be

    Middle East unrest spreads, at times violently

    No longer than the original and it doesn't violate anyone's grammar (AFAIK)

  24. Barbara Partee said,

    February 18, 2011 @ 8:23 am

    One point seems clear: the headline says that some of the spreading was violent but the writer probably meant that some of the unrest was violent. But what's less clear is whether and why the headline might even be ungrammatical, and I think that's indeed puzzling.

    maidhc said
    I have a hard time accepting "X, some Y" unless X is countable and plural. If X is non-count and singular, it doesn't change "some" into "some of it" in my mental model. "Seawater, some polluted with diesel fuel, surged through the gap" doesn't sound right to me.
    Mark M cited that comment by maidhc and said:
    I agree about that example. But consider "Seawater, some polluted with diesel fuel, has been blown to the tops of many shoreline cliffs"? For me, your example sounds wrong because it's about a single mass of seawater, where pollution physically can't be limited to "some". Where there are separate masses, the "some" can be read as referring to some of these distinct and countable units. At least for me, that implicit countification licenses the "some".

    I think Mark M has hit on a crucial distinction. And I don't myself know of any syntactic or semantic theory that makes that distinction expressible. There may be one (or more) — if so, I'd like to know it. I find this very interesting!

    [(amz) I've expanded on Mark's and Barbara's comments in a posting on my blog, here.]

    By the way, I'm glad I didn't see this earlier — I might have taken myself to be one of the colleagues Mark was appealing to and made up an answer, but I never would have thought of all the factors that the commenters have been bringing to light. I love Language Log and I (often) love our readers!

  25. Chris Travers said,

    February 18, 2011 @ 12:07 pm

    I think it is perfectly grammatical in the dialect of English we may call Contemporary News Paper Headlines English, noted for frequent use of ellipses in order to save space, and a lack of attention to ambiguity.

  26. Chandra said,

    February 18, 2011 @ 12:38 pm

    Rubrick's mention of The Beatles as a plural name for a singular entity (band) that actually refers to a plurality (multiple band members) got me thinking.

    I'm okay with "some" being elliptical for non-count nouns that refer to physical substances that might be divided into droplets or clouds or whatever: milk, oil, smoke, etc.

    But when it comes to non-count abstract nouns whose function, you might argue, is to "singularize" many individual instances of a thing ("unrest" standing for the individual actions or words of many people; "the flu" standing for a multitude of instances of people getting sick; "love" standing for the many varying experiences of affection between two people; etc.), my instinct is that it sounds wrong to divide the non-count abstract noun itself with a modifier like "some". I'm not exactly sure why.

  27. Sid Smith said,

    February 18, 2011 @ 2:03 pm

    I stand by "Some unrest spreads violently in Middle East" as evidence that the headline isn't ungrammatical. It does seem to be a garden path for some people, tho.

    (And, certainly, the h/l writer probably didn't mean to say that the spreading is violent.)

  28. Chandra said,

    February 18, 2011 @ 2:51 pm

    @Sid Smith – In the example you give, I only read that as semantically acceptable when I parse it as "an unspecific small amount of unrest spreads violently in the Middle East", as opposed to "a certain portion of the general unrest that's occuring in the Middle East is spreading violently". The latter, which is closer to what I believe the headline writer intended, is still very problematic, at least to my ears.

  29. Sid Smith said,

    February 18, 2011 @ 4:36 pm

    @ Chandra –

    Interesting point. But to my ear both interpretations work fine — ie, including "Some unrest spreads violently in Middle East [and some of that same unrest spreads but not violently]."

  30. Sili said,

    February 18, 2011 @ 5:21 pm

    A former Danish newsreader recalled his worst gaffe as having said "Twelve dead, six fatally so."

  31. Nelida said,

    February 18, 2011 @ 6:16 pm

    To me, the headline was also a "huh what" moment. The violence here, in my opinion, should apply to (qualify) the unrest, not the spreading. And so I vote for "unrest, some of it violent, spreads in Middle East".

  32. Elijah said,

    February 18, 2011 @ 8:19 pm

    I agree that the headline is unremarkable. Chalk it up, I guess, to my monkey brain just understanding what the writer meant to say, even if outwardly the syntax might have been awkward (which I don't think it was). I have been known to be pretty liberal in what I accept as grammatical though.

    As long as we're discussing issues (or irks) of these types of distinctions (mass/countability), one thing I don't like is when plural agreement is used for band or company names. Constructions like "Sucker Punch have released a new game" always make me cringe.

  33. J Lee said,

    February 18, 2011 @ 8:57 pm

    I am baffled as to how this headline occurred to the editor before "Unrest, Some Violent, Spreads in Middle East." Perhaps that would appear to wrongly blame the physical violence on the protesters rather than security services. So there is further semantic confusion from the fact that one assumes that those feeling the 'unrest' are the ones acting violently and that 'unrest in the Middle East' is seen by us perpetual but only expressable in specific instances/acts (as noted above). So 'unrest', 'strife,' and other media cliches are not only annoying but confusing too.

  34. Bloix said,

    February 18, 2011 @ 11:43 pm

    In "Some unrest spreads violently" some is an adjective. How much unrest? Some.

    But in "Unrest spreads, some violently," some is a pronoun. And it can only relate back to a plural noun.

    If this doesn't persuade you, try:
    Hot water spreads quickly.
    But not: Water spreads, hot quickly.

    The error the headline writer is making stems from the fact that some can be more than one part of speech. But it can't function as both at the same time.

  35. John Walden said,

    February 19, 2011 @ 3:40 am

    So I can't say

    "Advertising: some is good, some is bad"

    because 'some' as a pronoun "can only relate back to a plural noun"?

    It seems a bit harsh.

  36. army1987 said,

    February 19, 2011 @ 1:47 pm

    I have no problems with singular “some” (e.g. if someone asks me if I have bread, I find it perfectly natural to answer “Yes, I do, do you want some?”), and “Some unrest spreads violently” sounds weird but acceptable to me, but for some reason “Unrest spreads, some violently” sounds *much* weirder to me.

  37. Nijma said,

    February 19, 2011 @ 2:00 pm

    @Elijah plural agreement is used for band or company names

    That's one of the classic differences between British and American English; the common textbook example is sports teams.

    This headline grates on my ear, I wonder if it grates on the British ear the same way.

  38. Pflaumbaum said,

    February 19, 2011 @ 6:06 pm

    @ Nijma

    Yes, it does. Well 'grate' isn't the right word… my subjective experience of it is like a mild version of how a zeugma 'feels'.

    @ Bloix – the CGEL rejects the categorisation of some in this position as a pronoun, with convincing arguments (pp421-3).

  39. John Walden said,

    February 20, 2011 @ 3:29 am

    It grates, if that's the word. But I don't think it's a BrE/AmE thing. It's "violently" that doesn't sit right to my minds ear.

    I wonder if part of the problem is eggcornish, that we're feeling that the word should be "virulently" when it refers to the rapid spread and "violent" when it refers to not all unrest being peaceful. But not both at once. So

    Unrest, some violent, spreads virulently in Middle East

  40. maidhc said,

    February 20, 2011 @ 3:38 am

    Another strange headline turned up on Yahoo News a few minutes ago, although when I went to look for it again I couldn't find it.

    The headline was something like "Yemen Police Shoot Dead Protester".

    The article started out something like "A protester in Yemen was shot dead by police…", which is unexceptional. It made me wonder if the headline was automatically generated.

  41. Chris Travers said,

    February 20, 2011 @ 6:22 pm

    Maidhc's story can be found at:
    http://www.skynews.com.au/world/article.aspx?id=579768&vId=

  42. bloix said,

    February 21, 2011 @ 12:29 pm

    Pflaumbaum- I don't own the CGEL but I do have access to Language Log, of course, and I found Prof Pullum's post on how this, these, and some are not pronouns but determinatives. And I have to say that I'm not convinced. I'm happy to stand corrected that some is not an adjective, but a determinative like the and this, but I cannot see how it does not also function as a pronoun, or perhaps as a noun.

    "Some came running." That's not a a determinative. You can't say, "The came running."

    Maybe some is sometimes a noun, in the way that numbers often are.
    "How many came running?" "Ten came running."

    I also accept that some resembles this and these. "Which ones are running?" "These are running."

    Another word in this category is such, although the pronoun-noun usage is becoming obsolete and persists only in stuffy legalese and in the phrase "as such," where among younger writers it's universally misused as a synonym for accordingly.

    If a word can be substituted in a sentence for a noun, then, it seems to me, it's a pronoun. If it can do other things, too, more power to it – many words serve as more than one part of speech. "I like the red M&M's but I don't like the blues." "These shorts are shorter than those." So why can't some and these be both determinatives and pronouns?

  43. Shiny said,

    March 2, 2011 @ 3:43 am

    The headline sounds pretty ungrammatical to me ears too, but am I the only one bothered by
    "The protests convulsed countries across the Middle East on Thursday"?

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