Is the phrase "Сумма денег" grammatically correct?

Question

Is the phrase "Сумма денег" grammatically correct? My tutor was teaching me about "тавтология" and said that this phrase was a case of it. I asked my Russian friends about it and they told me that they don't agree with her and that there's nothing wrong with using that phrase in both casual and formal conversations/correspondence. But I really need an expert opinion. I've tried doing my own research on this, but I'm still not sure about what's right.

Answer 1

Yes, сумма денег (or денежная сумма) is both correct and idiomatic.

Not sure why it was used as an example of tautology. Tautology is saying the same thing twice, as in «прейскурант цен» where the meaning of 'price' appears as "прейс" and "цен".

Actually, I do know why сумма денег might seem tautological. The word сумма by itself is quite often used to mean денежная сумма, thus adding денег might sound like you are saying денежная сумма денег which would be a tautology.

Answer 2

Although we do say «сумма денег» or «денежная сумма» quite a lot in colloquial speech, it should be avoided in writing.

Let's look it up in the dictionary.

сумма ы, ж. (лат. summa).

1. Итог, результат сложения. С. двух слагаемых.

2. перен. Общее количество чего-н. С. всех данных.

3. То или иное количество денег. Затратить крупную сумму. (a certain quantity of money)

Толковый словарь иностранных слов Л. П. Крысина.- М: Русский язык, 1998.

I also came across the following:

Словарь ошибок русского языка сумма

«Сумма», поскольку одно из значений этого слова «некоторое количество денег», то следует признать нередко встречающиеся словосочетания «сумма денег» или «денежная сумма» неправильным: вполне достаточно просто «сумма»

Словарь ошибок русского языка. 2006.

Since one of the meanings of the word «сумма» is "certain amount of money", we should consider сумма денег and денежная сумма to be wrong. It's enough to use сумма in reference to money.

Your teacher is right — even though we do say it. Perhaps things will change in the future.