who - whom - whose - that - which - where We use who for a person, and which for a thing or an idea. We use that for both a person and a thing/idea. Whose is a possessive pronoun. When who is the object, whom, with a preposition, can be used instead, but it is formal and rather old-fashioned. In modern speech, we use who, or we leave out the pronoun. Where (relative adverb) refers to places. Examples of use : -À I know a woman. She speaks 6 languages. -+ I know a woman who speaks 6 languages. -À I know a woman. Her husband speaks 6 languages . -+ I know a woman whose husband speaks 6 languages. I spoke to a person yesterday. -+ The person to whom I spoke yesterday (formal speech). -+ The person (who) I spoke to yesterday (everyday speech). -À I live in a house. Its 200 years old. -+ I live in a house which is 200 years old. -À Thats the hotel. We stayed there last year. -+ Thats the hotel where we stayed last year. -+ ThatÔÇÖs the hotel that we stayed in last year. When can we omit relative pronouns? Compare : - The woman who wanted to see me was a doctor. (subject) - The woman (that) I wanted to see was a doctor. (object) Relative pronouns can be omitted in the following cases : 1) When they are the object of relative clauses (as above). ex : - The candidate (that) I interviewed was from Japan. 2) In reported speech : ex : - He said (that) Mr. Bell had invented the telephone. 3) After adjectives : ex : - Im glad (that) you came. - She was surprised(that) he noticed. {mosimage} (explanation in Dutch)
Posted on: Fri, 14 Mar 2014 05:27:27 +0000
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