(For pedants only) - ‘There’s now two Eiffel Towers….’

I agree about BBC dumbing down. It seems more concerned about including the widest possible variety of accents and speaking abilities than whether the listener/viewer can understand them. My pet hate at the moment is a certain radio presenter who insists on saying "ayyyyyy" and "theeeeeee" every time he comes across "a" and "the" in a sentence.

I would never say 'there is two Eiffel towers' and I have never heard anyone say it. I can understand trouble using the singular as in 'there are a group of children at the Eiffel tower' instead of 'there is'.
I may not get grammar right every time, but I do try, instilled in me by my parents.
I hate this sloppy 'it doesn't matter'. It does.

I'm beginning to think that as far as the English language is concerned anything goes. Correcting people is frowned upon. I have a neighbour who will greet me with " How is you?" Perhaps it's supposed to be funny.
Another irritant is 'me' instead of 'my'. "I can't find me pen." Grrr...

Grammatically, I think il y a is defined as an idiom and that French has never distinguished between whether whatever it was is singular or not.

German likewise uses Es gibt's irrespective of whether the following is singular or not.

It¨s even easier in Danish, as verbs are not declined but stay the same all the way through each tense.

It doesn't bother me. It's a fairly common idiom.

I get more exercised about "the government are…". "Ministers are…", maybe, but there's only one government whose members share collective responsibility.

Thanks, foxy and witz.

I dare say Esperanto is the only exception.

Oh let’s not get started on that I remember a now-departed poster who was very eloquent on that subject.

I suppose the bottom line is, real languages have rules which have evolved, Esperanto is a made up “artificial” language so much more set in stone.
I always felt the trouble (if such there is) about English is that we seem to have relatively few rules and lots of exceptions!
So often something just “feels” right -or wrong- but we may not necessarily know why!
The order of adjectives for instance.
A small brown dog, not a brown small dog. And so on!

Joseanne, I don’t think there’s a simple explanation - other than saying that some languages’ rules differ from others, and may not seem at all logical. (I dare say Esperanto is the only exception.)

I well remember students (mostly speakers of Arabic) asking me e.g. why in English we say ‘going to work’ or ‘going to school’ but ‘going home’ - why don’t we say ‘going to home’?
Well, we just don’t!

Witzend

Baggs

Maybe "il y a" is now defined to mean there are as well as there is.

It’s always meant both. At least, ever since I started learning French in the early 60s.

My point too @ Witzend

Sloppy and lazy.
What grates with me is Ter instead of to as in we are going to It seems obligatory on the radio.

Baggs

Maybe "il y a" is now defined to mean there are as well as there is.

It’s always meant both. At least, ever since I started learning French in the early 60s.

Funnily enough, I would always say it correctly in the past tense, like..... there were 2 towers, never there was two towers..

Baggs

Maybe "il y a" is now defined to mean there are as well as there is.

No “maybe” about it.

"There is" + plural is just sloppy, if written.

Truthfully, if I'm writing, even just for myself, or if I'm public speaking I would always use "There are".

Baggs

When I was doing EFL training, what 'native' English speakers actually say was stressed as more important than what 'native' English speakers should say.

Everybody does not say it, though. And to me, ‘there are’ really doesn’t sound like ‘thorough’.

I taught EFL overseas (CELTA qualified at the British Council) and since our students so often had to pass exams where correct versions were required, we stuck to those. Purely colloquial, everyday speech may well be a different matter, but from experience, most students do want to know what is officially correct. Dd found the same when teaching EFL in sundry countries.

I wouldn't like to see there's written where it should be there are but spoken language is often different from written and I don't have a problem with that.

Maybe "il y a" is now defined to mean there are as well as there is.

This always trips me up.
And I've never worked out why it never changes in French, even if there is more than one object.
Il y a des grèves en France. There's strikes in France.
Can anyone explain, svp?

I should admit that I'm impervious to what is said on the BBC as I never listen. I read some stuff.

I agree Witzend. Can’t stand it. The BBC has gone to the dogs.

When I was doing EFL training, what 'native' English speakers actually say was stressed as more important than what 'native' English speakers should say.

It's what people say.

Thers is fractionally easier to say than therer (a softer version of thorough) and the latter sounds weird. try it 😜