Okay this is silly but me and my friend are having a grammar argument. I asked her to go to dinner via text message and she said she couldn't because she had to study for finals. I jokingly said "You always have an excuse" her response was "finals is a legitimate reason" I then jokingly corrected her and said "Finals ARE a legitimate reason." She said is was the appropriate form of the verb. I disagree. You wouldn't say "Beds is a good place to sleep" or "hummingbirds is pretty." Who is right?

To my understanding, this statement is about an event, which is the occurrence of the final examinations. Her expression is abbreviated "finals" instead of final exam time, which is ONE EVENT, and therefore the verb 'is' is referring to ONE EVENT which is ONE REASON and therefore grammatically correct.

I do believe this is correct, unless proven wrong !

J Aubrey RN,

You have put up a nice query.

S. Sohban: You are quite right.
J. Aubrey : See, when you use a helping verb, you need to see the sense of what the noun or pronoun is. Here, there are three sentences -

I. Finals ARE a legitimate reason.
II. Beds is a good place to sleep.
III. Hummingbirds is pretty.

Here, 'finals' means - The event of finals; so it becomes - The event 'of finals' is a legitimate reason
Bed is a good place, and not beds is. 'Beds are' is correct, on the other side.
Similarly, hummingbird is AND hummingbirds are.

Furthermore, see the following sentences -
a. India has won. (If it is wrestling match, in which only one player contests.)
b. India have won. (It it is cricket match, in which 11 players represent one side.)

Why?
a. (The player of) India
b. (The players of) India

I hope you have a clue to what you asked. For further queries, the forum is open. Do not forget to give your reaction.

It really depends on if she had one test or multpile tests. The S on finals may be the error that created this issue.

These are excellent responses. But to clarify we were speaking about two test specifically. A bio test and a psych test. I didn't include that because it seemed to not be relevant. It seems though that both of us could be right depending on how we both interpret the context...

Finals ARE a legitimate reason is the correct response.

The word FiNALS is plural, therefore you use the plural form ARE rather than the singular form IS.

It's "finals are" simply because a student normally doesn't take just one final. Finals is not one event, but a series of events, a whole bunch of exams.

If she does have only one, she would have said, "My final is a legitimate reason."

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Check here this site will help you out a lot Present Simple Tense Chart - English Grammar