Showing posts with label relative pronouns. Show all posts
Showing posts with label relative pronouns. Show all posts

Thursday, 13 October 2011

When to use Who or Whom?

 I was rather surprised to see this tweet, and was even more surprised to see it being retweeted. 

So, when do we use 'whom'? To be honest, it is rarely used in informal spoken conversations, and you're more likely to see it in written form, but let's take a more detailed look at 'who' and 'whom'.











As a question word

Who is used without a following noun to ask about people.

Who is that boy standing over there?
Who was your favourite teacher?
Who said that?

Note that here we are using who to ask for the subject.

We also use who as an object in questions.

Who is she going out with?
Who does she love?
Who are they following?

Whom is possible here, but sounds rather stiff and formal.

With whom is she going out? (We prefer to use prepositions before whom)
Whom does she love?
Whom are they helping?

As a subject of a defining relative clause

Last night I saw the teacher who teaches us technology.

Who is the subject of the relative clause:

I saw the teacher. The teacher teaches us technology.

We cannot use whom, nor can we remove who.

As an object of a defining relative clause

That's the teacher who I saw last night.

Who is the object of the relative clause:

That's the teacher. I saw the teacher last night.

In this case, we can use whom (more formal) instead of who, or leave it out altogether.

That's the teacher who/whom/- I saw last night.

As a subject of a non-defining relative clause

Non-defining relative clauses are more common in a formal style, especially in writing.

I saw Mrs. Potter, who teaches us technology, last night.

We cannot remove who nor can we use whom instead.

As an object of a non-defining relative clause

That's Mrs. Potter, who I saw last night.

Since non-defining clauses are more formal, and we prefer whom in formal styles, we often replace who with whom here.

That's Mrs. Potter, whom I saw last night.

In cases where a preposition is present, we prefer it before whom.

He is very angry with Paris, who he had an argument with last week.
He is very angry with Paris, with whom he had an argument last week.

Valerie, who I told you about just now, is getting married.
Valerie, about whom I told you just now, is getting married.

Here's a group from the Swinging Sixties, Juicy Lucy, performing a Bo Diddley tune, 'Who do you love?'


       

Sunday, 4 October 2009

Bag the vocab! Ideas for practising vocabulary (Teachers)

One of the articles that has been in the pipeline for some time now is 'ideas for teaching vocabulary'. Unfortunately, due to time constraints,  I have been unable to bring it to fruition. So, it was with great pleasure that I read Jennifer's  recent post, and an even greater pleasure when she gave me permission to reproduce it here (Jenny, I hope you don't mind, but I've chopped and changed it a little). It's a fun activity to practise vocabulary of common objects, and can be adapted and extended to suit most levels.

STEP 1 – Select a few common objects, and place each one in a separate soft bag or an envelope. Any objects are suitable, as long as they aren't messy!  Number the bags/envelopes.

STEP 2 – Pass the bags/envelopes around the room, or leave them on your table. Students try to guess what the object is by feeling it through the bag. They are not allowed to look in the bag or remove the object. They then write the number of the bag, the name of the object and its purpose/definition. For higher levels, it's a good way to practise relative pronouns: "It's an object which you use to write with". For lower levels, they can say, e.g. "You use it to write on a piece of paper".

STEP 3 – Randomly ask a student for his/her answers. Check if anyone has a different answer. Show the object, and write the word on the board. Make sure they check the spelling of the word in their notebooks. Repeat this procedure for the remaining bags.

STEP 4 – Brainstorm uses for the object. You can even have a competition to choose the most original answers!

STEP 5 – For intermediate students, you can extend the activity to practise advice. This could be done in pairs or groups. One relates the nature of the problem, and the other offers the advice.

Example:

Situation: The clock on the wall isn’t working. It stopped this morning.
Advice: You should change the battery.