Making a pronoun agree with its antecedent

I'm going to say right away that not all pronouns should have antecedents (nouns that pronouns refer to). There are certain pronouns that don't have antecedents, or that refer to nouns that are implied in the meaning of the sentence. For example:

WHEN I STEPPED OUT OF THE RESTAURANT, IT WAS RAINING.

In the example above, the pronoun IT does not refer to anything mentioned in the sentence. It refers to the weather--the condition or the situation in which the sentence is uttered--which is only implied in the meaning of the sentence. Some writers call this a dummy pronoun. Another example is the first word--it--of the second paragraph below.

Nature has that special power to calm the mind, soothe the frazzled nerves and rejuvenate a weary urbanite. 

It is thus not surprising to hear of property developers incorporating in their designs patches of gardens and greenery that will provide its residents swatches of nature right at their own backyards.

Pronouns that do refer to nouns in a sentence are called referential pronouns, because they refer to something. Now read the sentence above once more.

Question: What does its refer to?

At first I thought a noun was missing, a noun that its was referring to, but if it refers to the plural property developers, then its should have been their.

I have nothing against long sentences. In fact,  I like Nick Joaquin's one-sentence opening paragraph in May Day Eve. The problem is that it is easy to get lost writing long sentences and commit errors in the process. I was at the realtor office waiting for my turn to speak to my account officer, and I picked up that newspaper. Reading the second paragraph, I sensed something was wrong because I felt lost. Maybe it's just me; I don't know.

Verb Tense Errors In Photo Captions

CAPTION: Vehicles negotiate España yesterday as a night of continuous rainfall spawned heavy flooding in many parts of Metro Manila.

I have written about verb tense errors in photo captions a number of times. The photo on the left shows another such error in the caption. Writers, especially journalists, write sentences on a daily basis and verb tense errors do not often occur in articles--at least not as often as pronoun-antecedent errors do. So it makes me wonder: why do they make errors in photo captions?

Is it because they get lost between writing present-tense captions and sticking to the journalistic method of stating the who, what, why and when?

Pronoun-Antecedent Agreement

A pronoun is a word that takes the place of a noun in a sentence. The noun to which the pronoun refers is called the antecedent. In some cases, the antecedent is also a pronoun.The relationship between a pronoun and its antecedent is called pronoun reference or pronoun-antecedent agreement. Let's take a look at some rules concerning pronouns and antecedents:

1. A pronoun must always agree with its antecedent in number, person, and gender.

Consider the following sentences[1]:

Hermione was waving her wand enthusiastically over the cauldron.

He gave a piglike squeal of pain, was lifted off his feet and slammed into the opposite wall.

Those who progress to using magic without shouting incantations gain an element of surprise in their spell-casting.

Congratulations. You earned a full-post reply.

This is a full-post reply to the first anonymous comment on another post.

Yawn! Okay so you are blogging on grammatical errors contained in various articles published in the Philippines. I can see what it is you are trying to accomplish, but after going through a few of your posts, I feel the need to suddenly turn off my PC. Consider adopting a more constructive, rather than, a condescending tone the next time you write. Doing so will make the casual reader more receptive to your ideas.

It occurred to me to write an acrimonious article, but I recently interacted with a bunch of happy pupils and I am particularly happy myself. Thanks for expressing your emotional comment. Can you really see what I am trying to accomplish?

Start-of-School Grammar Lessons

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The month of June means the start of school here in the Philippines. Among the first assignments given to grade school and high school students are the different branches of science, definition of basic terms (What is "technology"?), and basic rules of grammar. I remember during our first day in Geometry, our teacher gave us what I thought was an impossible assignment: the definition of the "undefined" terms of Geometry. Before you head on to Google, they're simply: point, line, and plane.

Now the lessons below are not likely to be given as first-day-of-class assignments, but I'd like to share them with you, Student, anyway.