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Using Adjective Clauses (#1)
Adjective clauses
(relative clauses)
are like "sentences
inside sentences." The "job" of
adjective
clauses
is to
modify
(describe, identify, make
specific)
the noun
phrases that they
follow. In their full
forms,
adjective
clauses
have several parts: a
relative pronoun (or, in
some
cases, another kind of connecting
word), a subject,
and a predicate
(a verb and, often, other types of
words which follow it).
In adjective clauses, the relative
pronoun is a kind of
connecting word: it joins the
information in the clause
to the
noun phrase that it follows.
Without the adjective
clause,
the meaning of the modified noun
phrase (and
of the sentence)
is unclear and incomplete.
Examples (full forms):
I know a person who / that
can help you.
I know a person who(m) /
that you can help.
I know a person whose
advice I can trust.
I know a person to whom I
can refer you. /
I know a person who(m) /
that I can refer you to.
I want a car that / which
gets good gas mileage.
I can't afford the car that
/ which I really want.
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Types of Adjective
Clauses
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1. |
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"Subject Pattern" Clauses
In this type of adjective
clause, the relative
pronoun is the
subject
of the clause.
Subject
pattern clauses can,
however, modify both
subjects and objects of
sentences:
The man who / that
talked to us
was very friendly.
Do you know the man
who / that
talked to us? |
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| 2. |
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"Object Pattern" Clauses
In this type of adjective
clause, the relative
pronoun is the
object
of the clause (but
an object pattern clause
can modify both
subjects and objects of
sentences):
The people who(m) /
that we met
seemed very friendly.
The people to whom /
that we were
speaking
seemed very friendly. /
The people who(m)
/ that we were
speaking to
seemed
very friendly.
I recently saw the people
to whom / that
we were talking. / I
recently saw the people
who(m) / that
we were talking to. |
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| 3. |
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Clauses Showing Possession
Here, the relative pronoun is
possessive
and is attached to
another word
in the
adjective clause:
The people whose
names are called
will work the first
shift.
Do you know the student
whose brother
won a gold medal
in the Olympics?
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