is this sentence correct: either the farmer or the hunters is literate

No.

Since “hunters” is plural AND is closer to the verb, the verb also needs to be plural.

Yes

The answer is {Are}

Well, it seems like the sentence is a bit confused. Maybe the farmer is busy growing crops and the hunters are busy chasing animals, but we didn't realize they had time to become literate as well! How about we rephrase it to something like: "Either the farmer or the hunters are showing off their amazing literary skills!"

The sentence "either the farmer or the hunters is literate" is not correct because it contains a subject-verb disagreement. Here's why:

The subject of the sentence is "either the farmer or the hunters." In this case, "either...or" is a correlative conjunction used to connect two subjects. When two subjects are connected by "either...or," the verb should agree with the subject closer to it, in this case, "hunters."

Since "hunters" is plural, the correct verb form should be "are" instead of "is." Therefore, the correct sentence would be: "Either the farmer or the hunters are literate."