In the example above, the adjective clause tells us about "the man. The form "whom" is becoming less and less common in English. Many native English speakers think "whom" sounds outdated or strange.
This trend is particularly common in the United States. Especially when combined with prepositions, most people prefer to use "who" as the object pronoun.
To most native English speakers, the examples below sound quite natural. Who, Whom, Whose f t p. Subjects, Objects and Possessive Forms To understand how to use "who," "whom," and "whose," you first have to understand the difference between subjects, objects, and possessive forms.
Subjects do an action: He loves movies. She goes to school. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby , It wasn't until the 18th-century that the sticklers of grammar took notice of this centuries-long peccadillo , emphatically declaring whose to be the possessive only of the relative pronoun who while whispering their acknowledgment that English lacks an equivalent possessive for which and that.
Their recommendation has been to use the construction of which for inanimate objects. This might work in some cases, but for the most part, it ends up sounding clumsy or stilted.
For example, compare the following pairs of sentences using whose and then of which. The car whose windshield is cracked is his. The car, the windshield of which is cracked, is his. Of note is how whose creates a smooth flowing sentence compared to of which. It is no wonder writers have chosen not to listen to the sticklers and to use whose in such cases. Another recommendation for when the possessive for an inanimate object might be called for is simply to construct the sentence without the possessive.
The avoidance of whose certainly works, but the fact is it is easier to borrow whose to convey possession for an inanimate object than to work around it. The persistent borrowing has resulted in filling the gap in modern English grammar, making the notion that you can't use whose for lifeless things outmoded, like the rules against splitting an infinitive and ending a sentence with a preposition. Hayley Milliman is a former teacher turned writer who blogs about education, history, and technology.
When she was a teacher, Hayley's students regularly scored in the 99th percentile thanks to her passion for making topics digestible and accessible. Our new student and parent forum, at ExpertHub. See how other students and parents are navigating high school, college, and the college admissions process. Ask questions; get answers. How to Get a Perfect , by a Perfect Scorer. Score on SAT Math. Score on SAT Reading. Score on SAT Writing.
What ACT target score should you be aiming for? How to Get a Perfect 4. How to Write an Amazing College Essay. If you have that tune stuck in your head the rest of the day, you can blame us. Whose Line Is It Anyway? Consequently, their roles had to be filled by CIA officers whose identities had not been revealed to the Russians.
Tom Clancy, Commander in Chief , Bessie carried a lantern, whose light glanced on wet steps and gravel road sodden by a recent thaw. Suzanne Collins, The Hunger Games , Whose grammar got a boost from this read?
0コメント