Example sentences of "[conj] [was/were] [pers pn] " in BNC.

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1 Or were we trying to make meagre the devotions of minds which were helped to pray by colour and symbol ?
2 Were we going to go for impersonal macro-solutions , or were we going to realise that the people were looking for us as their leaders to provide an answer to their difficulties ?
3 Or were we tapping into some kind of general biochemical mechanism relevant to all types of learning ?
4 If so were the figures I posted for corners etc totally false , or were we like ‘ Cobras with arthritis ’ again ?
5 Or were they really unnerved by its stated intention to improve ‘ standards of taste and executive ability . ' ?
6 Or were they rather lighter , almost
7 Two enlarged bomb-shaped protuberances of pure dazzling chrome — or were they bombs after all ?
8 Was the wind making her eyes water or were they tears ?
9 Was she the author of the Casket Letters , those letters which totally implicated her in the murder , or were they forgeries ?
10 Or were they dead as so many others clearly were .
11 Or were they number 58 's children ?
12 Was he really ‘ guided ’ in his wanderings or were they no more than the meanderings of an old man ?
13 Or were they spider 's web-threads ?
14 Were they , as has been asserted , in large measure recruited from chapmen who had made their pile — new men in the full sense of the phrase ; or were they , as some more recent historians have emphasized , more often recruited from the sons of local landed families who had taken to trade ?
15 Were they in the interests of freedom to follow tradition and protect and facilitate a march , albeit odious in its characteristics , or were they to seek a ban under the Public Order Act 1936 ?
16 Were my beliefs my own or were they merely the product of my culture , my country , my education or a legacy from my parents ?
17 The film 's shooting was marked by outbursts and tantrums from Mr and Mrs Madonna ( or were they Mr and Mrs Penn ? ) , mostly involving confrontations with reporters and photographers .
18 Or were they simply concerned at the number of rules that were being broken by the programme 's makers ?
19 Or were they ?
20 Or were they mind-slaved prisoners captured during the suppression of some planetary revolt , and sentenced to serve the Imperium usefully by their deaths ?
21 Or were they zombie bodies , specially bred and conditioned , and thus essentially unhuman ?
22 Or were they a security squad determined to drive some supposed gawping cluster of citizenry below , unsure as yet in the darkness of their rank or affiliation ?
23 Or were they more intent on capture and rapid interrogation ?
24 The question which remains to be solved is : were these phrases added to existing documents in 1070–72 to support Lanfranc 's claim to primacy over the whole area of the British Isles , or were they added as a last resort in 1120 , when the claim which Lanfranc , Anselm and Archbishop Ralph had all supported was facing final and irrevocable defeat ?
25 The documents he mentions are those which now have in them the forged primatial passages , and the only question which arises is : were these passages already in them when Lanfranc wrote these words , or were they added later ?
26 Did people refuse to co-operate , or were they uncontactable , having moved or died ?
27 Or were they , like modern neurotics , mistaking a thought , or a wish , for a deed ?
28 Were ‘ Archaos ’ paid the full amount owed to them by the Dublin Theatre Festival or were they paid , as has been rumoured , just a fragment of that money ?
29 Or were they inextricably related ?
30 Erm I w I was going to say , going back to China , erm they 're a bit frightened of China now in , in what was the Soviet Union I heard the other day , were th were they a little bit anti China 's type of communism before er the Soviet Union fell or were they all , all pals together ?
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