speak good English: correct or wrong English
We are still on the sentences I gave out some weeks ago for you to determine whether they are correct or not.
- Between you and I, we must keep this matter a secret.
This sentence is incorrect. This is because the pronoun I is supposed to be in the object case — me — not the subject case, as it is presented here.
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In grammar, pronouns that come after prepositions (on, in, between, among, behind, in front of, beside, under, etc) must be in the object case, not the subject case.
The correct sentence should, therefore, be: Between you and me, we must keep this matter a secret. Other examples are:
Between him and them, there is no love lost.
Lunch for the girls is on us.
Between her and me, there is not much difference.
- The two boys we saw are in my class and all are my friends.
This is another incorrect sentence.
It is incorrect because the word all should be both.
In English, some words are number specific, meaning that those words are used for specific numbers or quantity items.
These number-specific words include both, between, each other, either ... or, neither ... nor, used strictly with the number two, and all, among, none, one another, all used with the number three or more.
Egs:
The man shared his properties between his son and his nephew.
Ms Tutu shared the mangoes among the pupils in her class.
So our correct sentence should be:
The two boys we saw are in my class and both are my friends.