idiom: consider

[coolrun]

what is correct idiom?

Consider X to be Y
Consider X Y
Consider X as Y

Thanks!

[RonPurewal]

all of them are correct.

the first two have exactly the same meaning; you'd use the first only when the extra words 'to be' are justified, either because they resolve some sort of ambiguity or because there's just A LOT of stuff between 'X' and 'Y'.
examples:
Most Americans consider Beverly Hills, a ritzy suburb to the north of Los Angeles, to be a desirable place to live. <-- possible ambiguity (could mean l.a. is desirable) if you don't include 'to be' here
Most Americans consider Beverly Hills a desirable place to live. <-- no ambiguity, so 'to be' would be unnecessarily wordy

--

'consider as' means 'consider restrictedly in the capacity of or in the role of'. for instance:
Considered as a work of art, Grant Wood's "American Gothic" is wholly unremarkable; considered as a depiction of everyday 1930's Americana, however, it is a classic piece. <-- i.e., the piece is unremarkable [i]from the standpoint of art, but remarkable from the standpoint of american historical portrayal.

[missionmba]

all of them are correct.

the first two have exactly the same meaning; you'd use the first only when the extra words 'to be' are justified, either because they resolve some sort of ambiguity or because there's just A LOT of stuff between 'X' and 'Y'.
examples:
Most Americans consider Beverly Hills, a ritzy suburb to the north of Los Angeles, to be a desirable place to live. <-- possible ambiguity (could mean l.a. is desirable) if you don't include 'to be' here
Most Americans consider Beverly Hills a desirable place to live. <-- no ambiguity, so 'to be' would be unnecessarily wordy

--

'consider as' means 'consider in the capacity of or in the role of'. for instance:
Considered as a work of art, Grant Wood's "American Gothic" is wholly unremarkable; considered as a depiction of everyday 1930's Americana, however, it is a classic piece. <-- i.e., the piece is unremarkable [i]from the standpoint of art, but remarkable from the standpoint of american historical portrayal.

==============================================================

Below is a question from MGMAT CAT with explanation.

Question:
William Shakespeare, though long considered as being one of the finest writers in English or any other language, was the subject of speculation over the years that he was not the real author of works attributed by him.

as being one of the finest writers in English or any other language, was the subject of speculation over the years that he was not the real author of works attributed by

as one of the finest writers in English or any other language, has been the subject of speculation over the years that he was not the real author of works attributed to

to be one of the finest writers in English or any other language, was the subject of speculation over the years that he was not the real author of works attributed to

one of the finest writers in English or any other language, has been the subject of speculation over the years that he was not the real author of works attributed to

to be one of the finest writers in English, was over the years the subject of speculation that he had not been the real author of works attributed by

Explanation:

The original sentence contains the unidiomatic "considered as being". The correct idiom is simply "considered", as in "I considered you a friend." Also, "was the subject...over the years" is incorrect. The sentence should use the present perfect "has been the subject," since the speculation began in the past and continues to the present. Finally, "attributed by" is not the correct idiom for this sentence. It should be "attributed to."

(A) This choice is incorrect as it repeats the original sentence.

(B) This choice repeats the original idiom error "considered as," though it corrects the other two errors.

(C) This choice repeats the original idiom error "considered to be" (with a slight variation) as well as the verb tense error "was."

(D) CORRECT. This choice corrects all of the original errors: "considered" instead of "considered as"; "has been" instead of "was"; and "attributed to" instead of "attributed by."

(E) This choice repeats the original idiom error "considered to be" (with a slight variation) as well as the verb tense error "was." It also introduces new errors: "or any other language" was removed from the sentence entirely, which changes the meaning; "over the years" is placed awkwardly; and "he had not been" is in the past perfect tense, when the correct tense is simple past.

Explanation to option B and C says :

-- idiom error "considered as,"
-- idiom error "considered to be"

Pls help on this. What to do on the real GMAT Exam?

[me.prasanna]

Hi,

Can we have some more light on this. Because most of the time i have heared that Considered As is always wrong.

In the red book also, it has been clearly mentioned that Consider As is always wrong.

I am not sure if there are any differences in the usage between consider and considered.

Kaplan also says that Consider As is always wrong

So if consider as is also correct in some cases that means, we may just not blindly ignore an option just because of using consider as in some place.

Can we please have some more expert comments on the same.

Thanks

[missionmba]

Hi,

Can we have some more light on this. Because most of the time i have heared that Considered As is always wrong.

In the red book also, it has been clearly mentioned that Consider As is always wrong.

I am not sure if there are any differences in the usage between consider and considered.

Kaplan also says that Consider As is always wrong

So if consider as is also correct in some cases that means, we may just not blindly ignore an option just because of using consider as in some place.

Can we please have some more expert comments on the same.

Thanks

Pls see this discussion

http://www.urch.com/forums/gmat-sentenc ... der-2.html

--------------------------------
RonPurewal/Experts pls comment.

[missionmba]

Please Reply Experts

[esledge]

I agree with Ron that you could use all three in a non-GMAT context. It's risky to use the words "always" and "never" in any explanation of idioms!

However, our official GMAT stance is:
RIGHT: considers X Y (e.g. I consider her a friend.)
SUSPECT: considers X to be Y (e.g. The judge considers the law to be unconstitutional.)
WRONG: considers X as Y. (e.g. The judge considers the law as (being)unconstitutional.)

The exceptions that would justify "as" are too rare and difficult for the GMAT to risk testing. There would almost certainly be some other grammar issues that would allow you select the right answer, but if not, play it safe and pick "consider X Y."

[sunil_snath]

Source: MGMAT 5

The banana that contains high level of potassium and other important minerals are considered to be one of nature’s healthiest fruits.

A. The banana that contains high level of potassium and other important minerals are considered to be
B. The banana, which contains high levels of potassium and other important minerals, is considered
C. The banana, which contain high levels of potassium and other important minerals, is considered to be
D. Bananas which contain high levels of potassium and other important minerals are considered
E. The banana, which contains high levels of potassium and other important minerals, is considered to be

As mentioned in this discussion I thought we need to use "considered to be" as there X (Banana) and Y (one of nature's healthiest fruits) are far away and chose E. But I was wrong.... According to MGMAT it is B.

Any advice?

[winstonhu]

Isn't 'Consider X Y' preferred to 'Consider X to be Y' because of concision?

[RonPurewal]

the definitive word on this issue is pretty much encapsulated in the posts above, by me and emily sledge.

here is the short version:

* you are probably going to be pretty safe with the assumption that "consider as" won't be correct.
as emily and i stated above, there is a certain niche for the usage of "consider... as..." in english writing, but it is extremely specific (it doesn't make sense unless you are talking about considering the same person or object in multiple different ways -- see my illustration above with "american gothic") and therefore extremely unlikely to show up on the exam.

* i don't think there is any meaningful difference between "consider X Y" and "consider X to be Y".
i can guarantee you right now that there will NEVER be a choice on which the ONLY "error" is the insertion of those two words "to be".
however, as emily noted above, the presence of those words can indeed be suspicious. therefore, if you see them, you should double down on your effort in scanning that particular choice for OTHER errors.

it's possible to formulate a sentence in which "consider X Y" produces an ambiguous meaning that would be rectified by the use of "consider X to be Y". in that case, the latter would be necessary, but i don't think this sort of situation has a very high probability of appearing on test day.

[lalatendu.das]

=========
'consider as' means 'consider restrictedly in the capacity of or in the role of'. for instance:
Considered as a work of art, Grant Wood's "American Gothic" is wholly unremarkable; considered as a depiction of everyday 1930's Americana, however, it is a classic piece. <-- i.e., the piece is unremarkable [i]from the standpoint of art, but remarkable from the standpoint of american historical portrayal.
==========

Hi Ron, w.r.t the explanation above, I want to discuss one of the usage of "consider..as". The below example is taken from Manhattan "Flashcards_SC_2009"

"Having considered the new District Attorney as the city’s "white knight," citizens of Newtown were dismayed by the ever"increasing numbers of violent crimes."

In the above case, the District attorney is operating in the capacity of a "white knight", shouldn't then the usage of 'consider..as" be correct in this case? The flash card, mentions the usage of 'consider..as' to be incorrect.

please clarify

[RonPurewal]

=========
'consider as' means 'consider restrictedly in the capacity of or in the role of'. for instance:
Considered as a work of art, Grant Wood's "American Gothic" is wholly unremarkable; considered as a depiction of everyday 1930's Americana, however, it is a classic piece. <-- i.e., the piece is unremarkable [i]from the standpoint of art, but remarkable from the standpoint of american historical portrayal.
==========

Hi Ron, w.r.t the explanation above, I want to discuss one of the usage of "consider..as". The below example is taken from Manhattan "Flashcards_SC_2009"

"Having considered the new District Attorney as the city’s "white knight," citizens of Newtown were dismayed by the ever"increasing numbers of violent crimes."

In the above case, the District attorney is operating in the capacity of a "white knight", shouldn't then the usage of 'consider..as" be correct in this case? The flash card, mentions the usage of 'consider..as' to be incorrect.

please clarify

let me clarify a little bit --

the above mentioned use of "consider as" is used when someone is considering only certain, restricted aspects of someone or something, and deliberately leaving other aspects out of consideration (see the example above).
it's not used to mean that people think of X as being, in general, Y -- that's what "consider X (to be) Y" is all about.

this is an accepted use in general english, but it's worth noting that it has never appeared on the official gmat; therefore, if you still find the issue excessively confusing, you may want to follow the rule of thumb that "consider as" is generally suspicious on this test.

[chembeti_aravind]

My take on 'consider' is simple.

If the emphasis on the result of consideration, rather than consideration itself, I use 'consider(ed) as'; otherwise I use either consider or consider to be, depending on the ambiguity level of the sentence.

-Aravind

[jnelson0612]

Great discussion everyone! :-)

[vidhya8826]

Source: MGMAT 5

The banana that contains high level of potassium and other important minerals are considered to be one of nature’s healthiest fruits.

A. The banana that contains high level of potassium and other important minerals are considered to be
B. The banana, which contains high levels of potassium and other important minerals, is considered
C. The banana, which contain high levels of potassium and other important minerals, is considered to be
D. Bananas which contain high levels of potassium and other important minerals are considered
E. The banana, which contains high levels of potassium and other important minerals, is considered to be

As mentioned in this discussion I thought we need to use "considered to be" as there X (Banana) and Y (one of nature's healthiest fruits) are far away and chose E. But I was wrong.... According to MGMAT it is B.

Any advice?

In the above sentence, there are 2 errors to be corrected.
1. idiomatic error -"The banana, (blah blah ... this is an extra info about banana) is considered healthiest fruits.(hence the option is 2nd )
2. subject verb agreement - In the other options, it is said that " ... are considered ". The subjet of the sentence is 'the banana', a singular subject should have singular verb (is). Hence the answer is option 2 which correct both the errors. Don't confuse the plural "potassium and other minerals" and go with plural verb. It refers to banana (singular)