Level: beginner
The relative pronouns are:
| Subject | Object | Possessive |
|---|---|---|
| who | who/whom | whose |
| which | which | whose |
| that | that | - |
We use relative pronouns to introduce relative clauses. Relative clauses tell us more about people and things:
Lord Thompson, who is 76, has just retired.
This is the house which Jack built.
Marie Curie is the woman that discovered radium.
We use:
- who and whom for people
- which for things
- that for people or things.
Two kinds of relative clause
There are two kinds of relative clause:
1. We use relative clauses to make clear which person or thing we are talking about:
Marie Curie is the woman who discovered radium.
This is the house which Jack built.
In this kind of relative clause, we can use that instead of who or which:
Marie Curie is the woman that discovered radium.
This is the house that Jack built.
We can leave out the pronoun if it is the object of the relative clause:
This is the house
thatJack built. (that is the object of built)
- Relative pronouns 1
- Relative pronouns 2
| Be careful! |
|---|
|
The relative pronoun is the subject/object of the relative clause, so we do not repeat the subject/object:
|
2. We also use relative clauses to give more information about a person, thing or situation:
Lord Thompson, who is 76, has just retired.
We had fish and chips, which I always enjoy.
I met Rebecca in town yesterday, which was a nice surprise.
With this kind of relative clause, we use commas (,) to separate it from the rest of the sentence.
| Be careful! |
|---|
|
In this kind of relative clause, we cannot use that:
and we cannot leave out the pronoun: We had fish and chips, which I always enjoy. |
- Relative pronouns 3
- Relative pronouns 4
Level: intermediate
whose and whom
We use whose as the possessive form of who:
This is George, whose brother went to school with me.
We sometimes use whom as the object of a verb or preposition:
This is George, whom you met at our house last year.
(whom is the object of met)This is George’s brother, with whom I went to school.
(whom is the object of with)
but nowadays we normally use who:
This is George, who you met at our house last year.
This is George’s brother, who I went to school with.
- Relative pronouns 5
Relative pronouns with prepositions
When who(m) or which have a preposition, the preposition can come at the beginning of the clause:
I had an uncle in Germany, from who(m) I inherited a bit of money.
We bought a chainsaw, with which we cut up all the wood.
or at the end of the clause:
I had an uncle in Germany, who(m) I inherited a bit of money from.
We bought a chainsaw, which we cut all the wood up with.
But when that has a preposition, the preposition always comes at the end:
I didn't know the uncle that I inherited the money from.
We can't find the chainsaw that we cut all the wood up with.
- Relative pronouns 6
when and where
We can use when with times and where with places to make it clear which time or place we are talking about:
England won the World Cup in 1966. It was the year when we got married.
I remember my twentieth birthday. It was the day when the tsunami happened.Do you remember the place where we caught the train?
Stratford-upon-Avon is the town where Shakespeare was born.
We can leave out when:
England won the World Cup in 1966. It was the year we got married.
I remember my twentieth birthday. It was the day the tsunami happened.
We often use quantifiers and numbers with relative pronouns:
| all of which/whom | most of which/whom | many of which/whom |
| lots of which/whom | a few of which/whom | none of which/whom |
| one of which/whom | two of which/whom | etc. |
She has three brothers, two of whom are in the army.
I read three books last week, one of which I really enjoyed.
There were some good programmes on the radio, none of which I listened to.
Comments
one or other means one of two people or things, when it does not matter which you are referring to - Would the formal version be "it does not matter to which you are referring"
She sits on a “reputation committee”, a subgroup of the company’s executive committee, which is chaired by the chief executive. - does "which" refer to "reputation committee" or the "executive committee"?
The government has received more than 2,000 submissions, mostly opposing the proposal. - As I understand the use of relative clauses and participial clauses, when we are referring to the noun which is at the end of a sentence, it would be better to use relative clauses rather than participal clauses, which tend to refer to the whole of the previous sentence. Since "most opposing the proposal" refers to the submissions, would it be better to say "which mostly oppose the proposal".
Thanks for your help teachers.
Hi Anisha00329,
I'll try to answer your questions in turn.
I hope that helps!
Best wishes,
Jonathan
The LearnEnglish Team
Hello thank for sharing this material. My question is, according to Cambridge Objective Advanced preposition cannot be used before "who" but "whom" can be used. If we want to use preposition with "who", it is supposed to be at the end of the clause. But here it says, who/whom can be used with the same way. Could you please explain that a little further? Many thanks in advance.
Hi Natavan Gojayeva,
Yes, in moden usage of British English, who is often used instead of whom. Here are some examples to compare:
1 and 2 are traditionally regarded as correct. In some varieties of English, it's not recommended to end a sentence with a preposition, so 1 and 3 would be regarded as incorrect. Version 3 uses who instead of whom (which is traditionally incorrect), but this would be the most commonly used version (in British English, at least) and few people would consider it an error. Speakers would only use 1 and 2 if they were making a special effort to speak correctly.
As you can see, it's a bit complicated :)
Best wishes,
Jonathan
The LearnEnglish Team
Hello thank you very much for your explanation. But my confusion is, here in the explanation "from who/whom" is correct to use. But in advanced cambridge it say preposition+whom is correct otherwise preposition has to come after the clause if we use "who/that"
E.g. She spoke to a professor that/who she is friendly with.
She spoke to a professor with whom she is friendly.
I hope I could explain. Thank in advance for taking time to read my post.
Hi Natavan Gojayeva,
OK, I see now. I agree with the Cambridge book you mentioned, and that is what is traditionally regarded as correct.
But, we can also consider how language is used in real life, which does not always follow what is traditionally regarded as correct. The examples above using who(m) are a description of what people actually say (in speaking, especially), even though it might be considered incorrect.
So, it's good to be aware of the "correct" forms if you are taking an exam, or writing or speaking in a situation where correctness is important. But in everyday, casual conversation, all the forms described above are acceptable.
I hope I've explained it more clearly now?
Best wishes,
Jonathan
The LearnEnglish Team
"Lindsey plays field hockey now, but last year she was on the soccer team". The coordinating conjunction "but" in this sentence is meant to connect two main (independent) clauses, each of which should rightfully be able to stand on its own given that they are main clauses. My question is that since second main (independent) clause "last year she was on the soccer team" uses a relative pronoun "she", which links to "Lindsey" in the first (main) independent clause, how can the second clause be considered a true (main) independent clause which can stand on its own?
And if indeed for this reason the second clause can no longer be considered as a true (main) independent clause, then doesn't this mean the use of the coordination conjunction "but" is not justified since a coordinating conjunction's role is primarily to link two (main) independent clauses?
Hello magnuslin,
The pronoun she requires a referent but that does not mean that it cannot be used in an independent clause. The referent can be in a different sentence, even a sentence which another person said, or it can be something extra-linguistic such as a picture of a person which is visible to the speakers.
More fundamentally, a sentence does not have to make sense to be grammatical. You can create perfectly grammatical sentences which make no sense at all.
Peter
The LearnEnglish Team
Hello every one . I have a setence combined like this.
Dr. Smith is a good surgeon. He lives next door.
>Dr. Smith is a good surgeon who lives next door. (Is this right?)
Hello kangmingoon,
Yes, that sentence is correct.
Well done!
Peter
The LearnEnglish Team
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