to think this Telegraph grammar test is wrong?

[Ogooglebar]

The question is 'can you tell from this sentence what sex Evelyn is?'

"I should like to introduce you to my sister Amanda, who lives in New York, to my brother Mark who doesn't, and to my only other sibling, Evelyn."

I think you can't tell but the Telegraph thinks you can tell that Evelyn is male.

How???

Here's a link to the test if anyone's interested.

[HorryIsUpduffed]

Remove all the names and you can tell the last one is male and lives in NY.

[Banderchang]

But what a terrible test! So prescriptive and in no way reflecting normal usage or natural speech. It's shooting itself in the foot by making "good" grammar seem impenetrable and stilted.

[TolliverGroat]

I am unconvinced by their explanation with the sentence as it stands (although I thought that would be the explanation). The absence of a comma before "who doesn't" is a significant distinction, but "my brother Mark who doesn't" is just ghastly.

[lydiajones]

This seems wrong to me as the fact they have put sibling before implies that the sibling is more likely to be female or you would have just said brothers in plural before.

[Ogooglebar]

I think the whole test it just knobby showing off. Grammar and punctuation are meant to add clarity and help avoid misunderstandings, not trick or confuse people.

[fedupwithdeployment]

I struggled hugely with that test, as did my former boss (the most pedantic woman on the planet!!) after I emailed her the link. Grammar is important (I am a lawyer!) but those sentences seem to be designed to be deliberately obtuse. Perhaps technically that sentence is correct, along with the explanation, but to me it just reads extremely badly.

[Ogooglebar]

It does read badly fedup, what's the point in making sure all the puncutation is correct if you're going to write so badly in the first place?

[BreconBeBuggered]

It's pure twattification. I'd have been looking for logic, not convoluted clauses, to tease out the meaning. And as for the commas - is there another sister, who doesn't live in New York, then?

[whiteandyellowiris]

oh i got 33% lol

[Absy]

"I should like to .." is very clumsy. BAD WRITING. Surely it should be "I would like to introduce you to ..." as "should" implies compulsion, and it doesn't make sense that you are compelled to like to do something.

(rest of the test is blocked at work, so I can't complain further)

[Ogooglebar]

Absy I think 'I should' is technically correct but no one ever uses it these days and it sounds odd.

[Ogooglebar]

Maybe I should say traditionally correct rather than technically. 'I should like to...' sounds very Jane Austen.

[BigBoobiedBertha]

No I don't get it either. Or maybe I don't agree with the answer but I am not a grammar wizard. Leaving out Mark makes no difference to me. I still wouldn't instantly say Evelyn was a brother so surely grammar has failed due to lack of clarity?

And anyway, given the statement, you have to assume that pictures or the real life people are there in front of you or it really makes no sense. Therefore, it is likely that Evelyn being a brother would be very obvious so the whole premise of the question is kind of irrelevant.

I have sent the link to pedantic DH to see what he makes of it!

And now I shall retire to fret about whether any of my post made sense and was grammatically correct.

[Absy]

It is the Telegraph, so using a construction from the late 18th/early 19th Century and refusing to move on sounds about right.

[HorryIsUpduffed]

I think it is clearer if you take all the names out.

This is my sister, who lives in NY, my brother who doesn't (at this point grammatically we are expecting "and my brother who does") and my only other sibling.

The sentences are definitely crap though. They have been cobbled together in too much of a hurry without consideration for sense and natural flow.

[MinnieBar]

I think Evelyn is a pre-op transsexual tbh?

[Guitargirl]

Interesting test - I had 83%, am assuming that's good but I did used to study languages which helps I think.

[Ogooglebar]

Guitargirl that's very good, I only got 67% and I've studied several languages and am an editor. Just not a very good one it seems

[Ogooglebar]

I didn't have to sign up amiciss, someone linked to it on fb and it took me straight to it. Maybe where I'm working has a subscription to the Telegraph website though?

[SweetestThing]

83% and former languages student here too.

[Tee2072]

I agree that Evelyn is trans and therefore we still* don't know if s/he is male or female.

[FriendlyLadybird]

I got 100%, but only because I'd read the answer to the Evelyn question on here. It is unbearably knobbish and Telegraph-like, with a whole load of assumptions of 'correctness' actually based on Latin grammar, not English. If Grove had his way, we'd all be writing like this.