TEXT: Common Errors in English Relative Clauses http://vlc.polyu.edu.hk/common/
English uses relative clauses (beginning with who, which, that) to refer to important nouns in sentences. Relative clauses postmodify (come after) the nouns they describe. This is the way English provides lengthy descriptions, since premodification (words placed before the element they describe) is very limited. Chinese, however, is a language which allows much greater premodification of nouns. Compare how the noun people is described in the sentences below :居住在美國城市的人通常都很貧窮的。(Live in America city people often very poor.)
People who live in American cities are often very poor.
Relative pronouns also help to bind elements of English together and to retain the basic Subject-Verb-Object word order of the language. The complex functions of relatives may make this a difficult area of grammar for students whose native language does not make use of the concept.
Added to these problems is the fact that the relative pronoun in a clause may "disappear".
For example:
One of the visiting company heads expected last week did not arrive.
(who was expected …).
And
The experiments she is currently working on are some of the most important in the University. (that she is …).
Relative Clauses (Test 1)
Decide whether the sentences below are correct or incorrect and identify what is wrong. Make corrections to the sentences by retyping them in the edit boxes. Focus on relative clauses here and remember that there may be more than one way of expressing the meanings of certain sentences correctly. The first one has been done for you as an example.
1. Students enter high-level educational institutions might face many problems
relating to study habits.
This sentence is incorrect. It should be :
Students entering/who enter high-level educational institutions might face many problems relating to study habits.
2. Poor families already possess a child should not attempt to have another.
3. The textbook which the teacher gave it to Ah Ling was an old and torn copy.
4. Many people were surprised that Kang Fei Yu, who only two years ago was bankrupt, now appeared to be very rich.
5. Wong Lai Ah was angry to be given a book which it was badly damaged.
6. A fellow student saw this felt sorry for Miss Wong and offered her his own book.
7. The man known as Luk Sok was both intelligent and wealthy.
8. The restaurant, which was both very spacious and clean, was in the centre of the city.
9. Experts all agree that dreams cause great anxiety and stress are called nightmares.
10. There are other authorities consider any dream is sad or upsetting to be a nightmare.
11. Are you going to see the film which showing at the ABC cinema?
12. There were three teachers at my school who dismissed for bad conduct.
13. I have a car goes more than 200 kph.
14. The victims of the earthquake their property was destroyed in the disaster were given temporary housing by the government.
15. There’s the man his money was stolen when he left his office unlocked.
16. Laboratory Number Three is the place in where I spend most of my working life.
17. Some educators in Hong Kong fear a future that neither Cantonese nor Putonghua is learned well.
18. She’s the kind of person has limitless energy!
19. His father, who lives in Guangdong and works for the government, is an excellent musician.
20. The invention China is best known is paper.Relative Clauses (Answer key)
1. The pronoun who represents the human subject noun students. The who + verb construction can be reduced to just the present participle of the verb.
2. This sentence is incorrect.
Poor families (which/that) already possess a child should not attempt to have another.
or
Poor families already possessing a child should not attempt to have another.
This is similar to 1. The pronoun represents the subject families and the pronoun + verb construction may be reduced to the present participle form of the verb. Note that both the which and that forms of the non-human pronoun may be used here because the family may be viewed as a non-human unit. This is an example of an identifying (sometimes called defining) clause. It is so named because it clearly specifies which kind of families are being referred to.
3. This sentence is incorrect.
The textbook (which/that) the teacher gave to Ah Ling was an old and torn copy.
Textbook is the object of this sentence and the pronoun (which/that) used to represent it may be omitted. Here is another (human) example:
The man I’m going to marry is very rich.
Is the same as:
The man who I’m going to marry is very rich.
It is worth noting here that whom, as in:
The man to whom I’m going to get married is very rich
is reserved in modern English for only the most formal of expressions.
Another example:
For whom are you waiting?
Most native speakers of English would say:
Who are you waiting for?
Important Note
Sometimes we can use adjectives instead of a relative clause to give a simpler form of expression. Sentence 3, for example, could be expressed as:
The teacher gave Ah Ling an old and torn textbook.
4. This sentence is correct.
This is an example of a non-identifying (non-defining) clause. This kind of clause usually contains, within a pair of commas, information of lesser importance than the main clause. The commas show that we can take out the clause they enclose without losing any of the main message.
Important Note
Non-identifying clauses are much rarer in English than the identifying ones in sentences 1-3. They have the function of supplying information which would be too lengthy to give in a pre-modifying (adjectival) way. We cannot say, for example:
Many people were surprised that the only two years ago bankrupt Kang Fei Yu now appeared to be very rich.
But we could paraphrase the sentence in a pre-modifying way to give:
Many people were surprised that the recently bankrupt Kang Fei Yu now appeared to be very rich.
5. This sentence is incorrect.
The pronoun it should be deleted. You can use either which or that here, because the clause is an identifying type. Remember that you cannot use that to represent a non-human subject or object in a non-identifying clause. For example:
Tang Kwok Yiu gave me his telephone number, that I promptly lost.
In these cases, you must use which.
6. This sentence is incorrect.
A fellow student who saw this felt sorry for Miss Wong …
You could also say:
A fellow student saw this and felt sorry for Miss Wong …
This is an identifying clause but the indefinite article a means that it is not a strongly identifying clause i.e. we do not know specifically which student is being referred to. However, if we used the definite article here and we assumed that this is the first mention of the student, we would say:
The fellow student who saw this felt sorry for Miss Wong …
7. This sentence is correct.
In this example, we can use either the relative pronoun + past participle form of the verb or simply the past participle of the verb.
Important Note
The identifying clause with the pronoun deleted is one of the most common types of relative clauses. Such clauses are often difficult to detect because we have no clear signal that a clause has been formed.
8. This sentence is correct.
This is an example of a non-identifying clause. If we lifted out the information from within the commas, the main message of the sentence would remain intact:
The restaurant was in the centre of the city.
9. This sentence is incorrect.
Experts all agree that dreams causing/which cause/that cause great anxiety and stress are called nightmares.
Here, a particular or specific kind of dream is being identified. This could be done by using only the present participle of the verb cause.
10. This sentence is incorrect.
There are other authorities which/that consider any dream which/that is sad or upsetting to be a nightmare.
You could express this information correctly by pre-modifying the noun dream:
There are other authorities which/that consider any sad or upsetting dream to be a nightmare.
This is allowable because there is not too much information in the pre-modification and this information consists mostly of straightforward adjectives.
11. This sentence is incorrect.
Are you going to see the film showing/which is showing at the ABC cinema?
The relative clause clearly identifies the film the speaker has in mind. The present participle carries the meaning of the active voice, but it is possible here to say:
Are you going to see the film which is being shown at the ABC cinema?
In this case, the passive voice appears. We can delete the relative pronoun to give:
Are you going to see the film being shown at the ABC cinema?
Important Note
Relative clauses like that in 11 can be altered to give a different time reference. For example, we could say:
Are you going to see the film which will be/has been showing at the ABC cinema?
Similarly with the past participle form:
Are you going to see the film which will be shown at the ABC cinema?
12. This sentence is incorrect.
There were three teachers in my school who were dismissed for bad conduct.
Note that if we took away There were… we would remove the need to form a relative clause here:
Three teachers in my school were dismissed for bad conduct.
The error in this sentence is closely related to errors caused by topicalization.
13. This sentence is incorrect.
I have a car (which/that is) capable of a maximum speed of 200 kph.
The identifying clause helps to describe what the car is like. Using pre-modification, we could only say:
I have a very fast car.
We cannot say:
I have a 200 kph-capable car!
14. This sentence is incorrect.
The victims of the earthquake whose property was destroyed in the disaster were given temporary housing by the government.
Whose is the relative pronoun used to show possession. In this case, the victims of the earthquake possessed the property. Another example:
The man whose wallet was stolen was extremely angry.
15. This sentence is incorrect.
There’s the man whose money was stolen when he left his office unlocked.
This example is similar to 14.
16. This sentence is incorrect.
Laboratory Number Three is the place where/in which I spend most of my working life.
The only difference between in which and where in clauses relating to place is that the former is very formal and the latter more informal. Where is perfectly acceptable in both spoken and written English. More common in speaking is to separate the relative pronoun and the preposition.
Laboratory Number Three is the place which I spend most of my working life in.
Important Note
You are likely to encounter a number of cases in which the relative pronoun is preceded by a preposition of some kind. For example:
That’s the museum about which I’ve heard so many good reports.
This could be expressed less formally as:
That’s the museum (which/that) I’ve heard so many good reports about.
Another example:
Classical Literature is a subject on which he loves to lecture.
Could become less formal by moving the preposition. The relative pronoun may be deleted:
Classical Literature is a subject (which/that) he loves to lecture on.
Note that you cannot use that instead of which in the preposition + pronoun construction. You cannot say, for example:
Classical Literature is a subject on that he loves to lecture.
17. This sentence is incorrect.
Some educators in Hong Kong fear a future in which neither Cantonese nor Putonghua is learned well.
This sentence contains a time-related clause. It is not possible to use where or that to separate the relative pronoun and its preposition in such clauses.
18. This sentence is incorrect.
She’s the kind of person who has limitless energy!
This is a simple example of an identifying clause which, with a little alteration, could be omitted to give a possessive phrase instead:
She’s a person of limitless energy.
But note that in this sentence the female subject is no longer one of a whole class or category; she is being referred to as an individual, so the meaning is rather different from the original.
19. This sentence is correct.
This is an example of a non-identifying clause which supplies some secondary information. The main message here is that the father is an excellent musician.
20. This sentence is incorrect.
The invention for which China is best known is paper.
or
The invention China is best known for is paper.
The first correction is more formal than the second. The second sentence does not actually use a relative clause at all but instead uses the verb phrase to be (best) known for (something). Either one of these answers is acceptable in both speaking and writing.
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