Questions tagged [relative-pronouns]
Relative pronouns introduce relative clauses that clarify or specify the antecedent. For example, in "Trees, which are plants, need sunlight to grow," the word "which" is a relative pronoun.
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Skipping a relative pronoun
My eyes widen, and I slowly turn toward the elderly gentleman standing at my side.
In this sentence, before "standing", "who" is skipped why?
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"as" and "that" interchangeability
This is a sentence from a piece of technical writing I am reviewing, penned by a British author, and I can't help but want to change "that" to "as".
That word still means the same ...
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Relative pronoun's position in non-restrictive relative clause
I'm learning the grammar of relative pronouns; I thought all relative pronouns should be at the start of a clause, and then I learned that pronouns can be put after a preposition, as in "The bed ...
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Why is this sentence from The Great Gatsby grammatical?
There's a bird on the lawn that I think must be a nightingale come over on the Cunard or White Star Line.
According to my very limited knowledge, shouldn’t it be "which came over" in place ...
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No relative pronoun [duplicate]
I've just come across these 2 examples of no relative pronoun:
and
They say you cannot leave out relative pronouns in these 2 examples, but I feel like even if the relative pronouns are left out ...
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Relative pronoun THAT and its omission
I recently encountered a grammar problem as follows:
"I hope it'll rain tomorrow."
"From ( ) you've just said, maybe you don't want to go on the picnic."
i. that
ii. what
iii. ...
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'that' vs. 'which'/'who' when multiple noun phrases are involved
The sentences at issue are:
"The company required a way to showcase their product line and its benefits that can not be typically highlighted in a traditional TV commercial."
"He ...
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Which part of the first sentence is referenced here with the "which"?
I have the following text:
The role of the IS internal audit function should be established by an
audit charter approved by the board of directors and the audit
committee.
Professionals should have a ...
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Why is this use of the relative pronoun incorrect? [duplicate]
A student asked me if they can say:
"The crabs are still alive which we caught yesterday."
Instead of:
"The crabs which we caught yesterday are still alive."
The student's example ...
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"Way" vs "Ways" in a specific sentence
I'm not sure if "way" or "ways" is correct in this sentence:
The ways power is used in factories varies by X, Y, and Z.
With X, Y, and Z describing different features of ...
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Relative pronoun qualifies one or more pronouns?
In the sentence "I have a cat and dogs who are dumb", does "who are dumb" qualify only the dogs or does it qualify of the dogs and the cat? Or is it ambiguous?
Depending on the ...
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Why "am" is used in the sentence "It is useless to me who ___ ill"? [duplicate]
(First let me clearly mention that I am from a non–English-speaking
country, so I may be wrong with my question.)
My brother encountered a question on his English test:
It is useless to me who ___ ...
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Is this natural? "There's somebody wants to see you." [duplicate]
I have learned the following sentence is grammatically correct because it is possible to omit the nominative relative pronoun in a sentence like "there is ...". I'm not sure if it is natural ...
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When ‘that’ follows an 𝒳-of-𝒴 subject, which noun phrase does ‘that’ refer to: the first noun phrase 𝒳 or the second noun phrase 𝒴?
I’ve seen those two quite different usages of that following an 𝒳-of-𝒴
prepositional phrase connecting two noun phrases 𝒳 and 𝒴 via the
preposition of, one in which it is used to refer ...
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"of whom" vs. "of which" when referring to people AND things
In the following sentence, partners includes both people (such as subject matter experts) and organizations (such as schools):
"These courses are taught by our partners, all of [whom/which] are ...
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Is “whose” a true relative pronoun? (and request for the full list of relative pronouns)
The internet is indeed a tangled web, and since anyone can write
anything, there is a lot of conflicting information about what is
and isn’t a relative pronoun. We all agree that who, whom, that,
and ...
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What to do when a relative pronoun seems to be both object and subject? [duplicate]
Consider the following:
I congratulate him.
He won the race.
I congratulate him who won the race.
I think these are straight-forward. The object of the main clause becomes the subject of the ...
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Why is there no relative pronoun in Bronte's sentence?
I have a question for which I hope to get an answer from a professional. My question is: why is there no pronoun in the following sentence in Charolotte Bronte's Jane Eyre, Chapter XXIV?
Here is a ...
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Could someone tell me how to use ‘that which’ together in a sentence? [closed]
I’ve read various sentences in which ‘that which’ is used together.
user443644
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Is "the hole where the tooth had been" acceptable [closed]
The hole where the tooth had been was now filled with cotton
( a dentist had just extracted the tooth.)
I wrote the sentence, but I hesitated using the relative clause, because I suddenly realized it ...
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Can I use "for which" here?
I'm writing a post, but none of below sentences sounds good to me.
This post is a record of the first five weeks that I've exercised in a gym.
or
This post is a record of the first five weeks for ...
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Relative pronoun "that" for plural antecedent? [closed]
Can the relative pronoun "that" be used for a plural antecedent?
For example, I would like to know whether the following sentences are gramartically correct or not.
I have two cars that are ...
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The use of What as a relative pronoun
I was doing a TOEFL exercise and I stumbled on this particular error-analysis question:
In the Indus Valley, what is now Pakistan and western India, most dwellings had drains for waste disposal.
The ...
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Can wh- pronouns function as objects in a wh- clause? [closed]
I've recently become interested in relative pronouns and wh- clauses. During my research, I found out about using relative pronouns as objects. For example ('that' is an object of 'my father'):
'This ...
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Is there a single word that means "each of which"?
I usually use each of which like as follows:
One big problem is decomposed into a number of subproblems, each of which implies that blah blah blah.
One day, I came across a word in a book that ...
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Which/ That/ Present Participle
I'm working on the translation of a product packaging.
Uses:
Boosting liver function which helps cleanse blood plasma, the liquid portion of blood which/that accounts for 55% of its volume.
Would it ...
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'Who' and 'That' are not always interchangeable
When using relative clauses, we encounter two types: defining and non-defining. We use commas with the former and not with the latter.
We know a lot of people who live in London.
John, who speaks ...
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A simple question about relative clauses
I just don't have a good reserve of names of parts of speech, so the question may be quite soft-ball.
I mean to say, "I am the only idiot in this world."
Now I want to convey the same ...
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Is this a correct usage of "what is"?
A philologist I know constructed a sentence like this:
The choice of language was determined by the need of integration of the module in the system, and by the fact that [language] has a large number ...
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Do verbs following relative pronouns need to be in the past tense if the sentence begins in the subjunctive?
"I would prefer someone who was a bit more sincere about their beliefs."
vs.
"I would prefer someone who's a bit more sincere about their beliefs."
The second sounds more correct ...
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Word class / part of speech of 'whoever' [closed]
I know that the word 'whoever' is a pronoun , but is it
a. an indefinite pronounce ,
b. a relative pronoun , or
c. An indefinite relative pronoun- and does such a classification actually exist?
Would ...
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Is "where" the only relative pronoun that cannot be omitted from an adjective clause?
When using adjective clauses, the relative pronoun can be omitted when it is not the subject of the sentence. For example:
"She is the person I ran into."
In the above example, being the ...
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How do 'within' and 'which' form a relative pronoun clause?
Routines offer a structure within which to prepare for performance.
I'm having trouble untangling the relative pronoun clause into a sentence of its own. At first glance, the two sentences combined ...
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How to identify the form and function of the word "that"?
I understand that "that" can be either a relative pronoun or a subordinating conjunction, I just don't understand when. I know that both of these create dependent clauses, and I am pretty ...
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in a way that everyone will understand
There are a few general principles that apply to all the kinds of teaching. The first principle is that the teacher should be clear. Whatever you are teaching, teach clearly. Discover what your ...
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Use of the pronoun "which"
I have a few silly questions about the use of the pronoun which:
In the sentence "A statistical model is a family of probability distributions of a random variable which is smoothly parametrized ...
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Verb agreement with relative pronoun "what" as subject [duplicate]
The following construction can be found in one of the post in the ELU.
remembering that the heart fibrils are what vibrate abnormally to cause a heart attack
The verb "to vibrate" is in ...
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What does the 'which' in 'after which refers to?
at one time the surface broke apart as a result of repeated impacts, after which the fragments rejoined through mutual gravitational attraction.
I understand the sentence can be re-arrange as below:
...
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You who think or thinks [duplicate]
Some days ago I heard a teacher saying the sentence:
I want to talk to you who thinks differently from the crowd.
It sounded unnatural, but if you consider that 'who' is the relative pronoun ruling ...
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When is the omission of relative pronouns acceptable? [duplicate]
So I learned that I tend to forget and unconsciously omit relative pronouns from my sentences, because apart from the fact that the meaning of some clauses without them remain clear and obvious, I ...
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for which X vs. for the X of which
In each quotation beneath, what happens if I replace with for which determination? Does anything change?
In Current
Sailing a resultant has to be found for two simultaneous courses
and distances. ...
user409391
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Use the object pronoun or the subject pronoun as the relative pronoun heading a restrictive clause that employs a transitive verb and a linking verb?
EXAMPLE:
James is the man who/whom we know is who won it.
I've been trying to work this out, but for the life of me, I can't work out in such a scenario as shown above if the restrictive relative ...
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I don't understand a function of phrase and a relative pronoun
I read an article today and didn't understand the structure.
"Facebook has 3 billion users across its portfolio of apps, a massive number that has raised questions by some legal experts, ...
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Why can you use relative clauses with implicit complementisers or relative pronouns?
Why are these correct?
The work I am doing is easy.
The house he lives at.
The book I am writing is about different realms.
The man I was helping thanked me.
The ant I was blocking the road of.
...
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Does omitting a relative pronoun change the meaning? [closed]
One of my students asked me if omitting relative pronouns like "that" changes the meaning of the sentence.
Here's the issue, in the books I have read mention that in spoken English (assuming ...
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relative pronoun 'which' vs 'that' [duplicate]
In this sentence, is there an error?
In the name of revamping the law, investigation and trial should not be altered in a way which undermines the principles on which the judicial system was founded.
...
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What are the rules regarding one antecedent followed by many relative pronouns? [closed]
Are any of these correct? What rules are at play here?
I saw the car which has five wheels and which we passed by earlier.
I saw the car which has five wheels which we passed by earlier.
I saw the ...
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Omitting the relative pronoun "that"
I came across this sentence while surfing on the Internet:
Now I'm calculating how many pages I should do per day (that) would be reasonable.
When read out loud, the sentence sounds sort of natural, ...
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What were/are the rules regarding relative pronouns from c. 1800?
I've been reading some rather old literature, often ranging from the 18th Century through to the late 19th Century, and I'm trying to increase my comprehension of the material, at least to the extent ...
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The relativized element of a relative clause?
“Wh” and non-“wh” relative clauses - Page 5:
“wh” relative clauses (“The bag which he put there was stolen.”)
“that” relative clauses (“The bag that he put ______ there was
stolen.”)
bare ...
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