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Globalisation encourage economic cooperation among/between nations.

My approach:

Before my teacher taught me i saw various rules and also found some questions here related to difference between between and among.

My teacher told me that certain words we have to remember because with "cooperation" use between.

My question is unique because this is a particular example.It can be treated as both and can have between/among.

So,my question was :

Are there any other words we need to remember because in my regular practice I only came across only this word?

tchrist
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justin takro
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2 Answers2

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Here’s an easy solution:

Try Always Using Between

If you always use between, then you will never run the risk of using among when you need to use between.

I know it sounds silly, but nobody will think twice if you use between all the time, but they will think twice if you use among all the time — because sometimes it’s completely wrong. As the OED notes, between

is still the only word available to express the relation of a thing to many surrounding things severally and individually, among expressing a relation to them collectively and vaguely: we should not say ‘the space lying among the three points,’ or ‘a treaty among three powers,’ or ‘the choice lies among the three candidates in the select list,’ or ‘to insert a needle among the closed petals of a flower.’

All those sound wrong if you try to use among there, and it is easy to find others just like them.

On the other hand, finding sentences where between sounds wrong to a native speaker but among sounds right is much more difficult.

So what’s the take-home lesson here? That you’re safer with between.

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tchrist
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Possible duplicate of “between” vs. “among”

Although that question calls the following distinction "prescriptivist poppycock," I have always used "between" for two, "among" for several or many.

Thus, there may be an agreement between Germany and Greece to resolve the latter's financial crisis, or there may be an agreement among EU nations to assist Greece with its economic woes.

The Grammar Girl makes a distinction between distinct, identifiable individuals (where she says to use "between," regardless of the number of individuals, as in "between Bob, Ted, and Harold, she preferred Harold") and a collection of undifferentiated members of a group (where she prefers "among," as "among the applicants, she preferred Harold") could be another way to make the cut.

Honestly, neither way of deciding seems cast in stone, as both seem equally arbitrary.

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Dave Land
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  • Seeing “Grammar Girl” cited as though she were a linguist makes me sad. – tchrist Sep 19 '15 at 03:48
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    Well, she was cited in "between" vs. "among," so I wanted to pass it along, given that few will actually follow the link. Just because she's popular and not a pure academic does not necessarily negate her value. In my defense, I found her argument no less arbitrary and unsatisfying than the one offered by Samuel Johnson 260 years before her and denounced by William Safire 20-odd years ago. – Dave Land Sep 19 '15 at 03:59
  • @DaveLand Yes this is the confusion. I already read that tchrist told me to read that again.I clearly mentioned also i was not able to differentiate in this example and therefore i don't think its a duplicate.Your explanation is right.It can be arbitrary. – justin takro Sep 19 '15 at 14:54