RELATIVE PRONOUNS | THAT, WHICH, WHO(M), WHOSE, WHERE, WHEN or nothing? | Explained with donuts

There are three things that you should never do in life: one don't tell your girlfriend about your

other girlfriend, two don't ask your people if they want to leave the biggest trading bloc in

the world and three, don't confuse your relative pronouns. Yes that's right relative pronouns

is what we're going to talk about today we're going to look at when to use that or WHICH

or WHO or WHOM or WHOSE when or where when you can omit the relative pronoun

and when you can't and how to pronounce relative clauses correctly.

Sounds complicated but, in fact, with this brain and with this doughnut I'm going to explain it

in a way that's super easy. That's right easy peasy relative pronoun so let's do it

Hello and welcome to LetThemTalkTV let's begin with a definition. What is a relative pronoun?

It's a word that connects two clauses. What is a clause? It's a phrase that has a subject and

a verb. For example, “I saw a panda bear.” That's a clause. It's also a sentence. It has a subject,

an object and a verb. Let's look at another phrase “the panda bear was smoking a cigar”

but what if we wanted to put them together into one sentence. “I saw a panda bear WHO” or “THAT

was smoking a cigar” so the relative pronoun WHO or THAT in this case links the two clauses

the relative pronoun normally comes after the noun they are called relative clauses

but they can also be called adjectival clauses because it's a series of words that describes an

action in this video. However, I'll be calling them relative clauses. Now there are two types

of relative clauses and these will help us decide which relative pronoun if any we use.

The two types of relative clauses are; restrictive relative clauses and non-restrictive relative

clauses. I will explain this in a moment but first have a look at this super easy graph. Now this

graph is just looking at THAT or WHICH. However, in this video we will also look at WHO and its

related forms WHOM and WHOSE as well as WHEN and WHERE. For non-restrictive relative clauses

you can use WHICH but never THAT in restrictive relative clauses you would usually use THAT but

other forms are possible. I'll explain that later. Only in restrictive relative clauses

can you sometimes omit the relative pronoun. What is a non-restrictive relative clause? So

you say something and you give an extra bit of information that is not crucial. For example

“these doughnuts are delicious” that's my message but what if I wanted to add a little

color to my description? “These doughnuts, which are going to make me fat, are delicious.”

I've added some extra information which doesn't change the basic message that these doughnuts

are delicious. I put the extra information with commas which I'll indicate by doing

this. Yes this means that there is a comma at the beginning and then and at the end of the clause

okay and in these clauses you always use WHICH and not THAT. Notice the pronunciation change

when you give the extra information. There is a slight pause and the voice changes tone

usually downwards. Listen again. “These doughnuts, which are going to make me fat,

are delicious.” A couple more examples; “this gold coin,

which I found on the beach, is 500 years old.” So my main message here is that the coin is 500

years old wow isn't that amazing but what if my main message was that I found it on the beach

then just switch it around. “This gold coin, which is 500 years old, I found on the beach.”

“The letter, which you sent me last week,

has still not arrived.” If the extra information is about a person you can use WHO

or WHOM or WHOSE WHO is a subject pronoun WHOM is an object pronoun but in reality WHO is usually

used for both. I'll show you what I mean. “Jane, who was here yesterday, ate all the doughnuts.”

There WHO refers to the subject “Jane, to whom I gave all the doughnuts,

is an accountant” After a preposition you put WHOM never WHO. However, most of the time you'll

move the preposition to the end of the clause and use WHO “Jane, who I gave all the doughnuts to,

is an accountant” WHOM is quite formal and rarely used though that you still hear it sometimes.

Mr Falco, whom I did not invite to sit at this table tonight, is a hungry press agent

and fully up to all the tricks of his very slimy trade. match me Sidney

not right this minute JJ. And there is one case where we still use WHOM

in everyday conversation. For more information on that check out this video. You can never omit

the relative pronoun from a non-restrictive relative clause. Finally you can also use

WHOSE which is a possessive before the noun “Jane, whose house is just up the road, loves doughnuts.”

Let's move on to restrictive relative clauses an example; “bring me the doughnut

that is next to the cheese.” If I just say to you “bring me the doughnut” you'll be rummaging

around the house for the correct doughnut. I have many and you won't know which one I want so next

the cheese is crucial information. It cannot be omitted and in this case you will usually use

THAT but there are exceptions and I'll talk about that in a moment. With restrictive relative

clauses you don't use commas so for example “Let's take the train that leaves at 9 30”.

There are many trains leaving that day so 9 30 is crucial information wouldn't you agree?

“The trousers that I bought yesterday are too small.” I have many pairs of trousers. We need to

know which one I bought yesterday. “that I bought yesterday” is crucial information. Can you use

WHICH instead of THAT? Generally yes, here's where it gets a little bit complicated. Some

English language style guides say that you should use THAT not WHICH in restrictive relative clauses

but other style guides say both are correct. What is explained here are grammatical guidelines

which are open to debate. They are not grammatical rules; you will find many examples from great

works of literature where, for example, you use WHICH in a restrictive relative clause.

Personally I prefer THAT rather than WHICH in restrictive clauses I feel the sentence usually

sounds better for example “I read an interesting book that's about dolphins.” okay “I read an

interesting book which is about dolphins.” For me THAT sounds better. It's clearer.

You know it's crucial information if you use WHICH in this sentence it could be a non-restrictive

relative clause or a restrictive relative course so I prefer THAT but that's just me. What do you

think? Answers in the comments so perhaps if you're taking an exam or writing formally you

might want to follow this guideline or you might not. Sometimes though a speaker might

choose to go against the guidelines anyway. For example in this sentence “I want the doughnut

that that man is eating.” okay you've got two THAT's next to each other it doesn't sound so

great. By the way, did you know that these two THAT's can be pronounced differently.

The relative pronoun THAT has a weak form THAT okay THAT with a schwa

for example. “This is the book that I told you about”, “this is the book that I told you about.”

THAT as a demonstrative pronoun (determiner) is always pronounced THAT “I want that

doughnut” and we say “I want the doughnut which that man is eating.” to avoid having two

THATs next to each other. By the way, while preparing this video I wrote this sentence

on a google doc and the grammar checker told me no it's wrong. It tells me that I should say

“I want the doughnut that that man is eating.” so I'm telling you that just to let you know that the

grammar checker can also be wrong or google can be wrong or whatever in the end you decide. As

I said these are guidelines not rules. Here is a rule though. In restrictive relative clauses

you can use THAT, WHO or WHOM to talk about people THAT is more informal as we said WHOM is

not often used “this is the man WHO” or “THAT” informally “robbed the bank.” “I met a girl

who lived on a farm.” “He is a writer whose books are read by millions.” After a preposition

you cannot use THAT as a relative pronoun you can only use WHICH or WHOM. Let's look at an example;

“let's go to the cafe in which we met last time”.... you cannot say IN THAT so you put in

WHICH but it sounds rather formal. We are talking about place so we can replace IN WHICH with where

which by the way is called a relative adverb you can use where after a noun let's go to the cafe

where we met okay fine, perfect. However, there is another way. If we really want to use THAT

we need to move the preposition after the verb “let's go to the cafe

that we met in last week” Okay, also perfect. You can use all three but IN WHICH is less common

what about this? “Do you remember the day on which we first met?” Again, sounds formal ON WHICH day

can be replaced by WHEN. “Do you remember when we first met?” THAT is also possible here too

by putting the preposition at the end THAT doesn't sound so natural though so let's skip

that for the moment. A word about pronunciation, restrictive relative clauses and non-restrictive

relative clauses may be pronounced in a different way. Remember what I said about non-restrictive

relative clauses: you put them between commas and you take a pause and the voice goes down.

In restrictive relative clauses the phrase is said in a single flat tone without a pause.

For example, “my sister, who lives in Muswell Hill, got married last week.” non-restrictive

“ my sister who lives in Muswell Hill got married last week”

restrictive. In the first sentence you've only got one sister so it must be a non-restrictive

relative clause and you're just giving some extra information in the second sentence you've

got more than one sister so it's a restrictive relative clause so can you hear the difference in

the pronunciation I say it once more my sister, who lives in Muswell Hill, got married last week,”

“My sister who lives in Muswell Hill got married last week.” Omitting the relative pronoun. As

we saw in the graph that we looked at, you can only omit the relative pronoun in a restrictive

relative clause but when? Actually, it's pretty easy to see how. In fact, before I tell you,

see if you can discover the rule yourself from these three examples. So where can you omit the

relative pronoun okay so three examples where you can and three examples where you can't.

here you can omit them: “This is the typewriter that I wrote my first novel on.”

“it's the most delicious doughnut that the world has ever seen.” “She's the girl

who I went to dinner with.” Here are three sentences where you can't omit the relative

pronoun “This is the book that was made into a movie.” “I met a girl who speaks 12 languages.”

“This was the evidence with which the criminal was convicted.” Did you get it? I'm sure you did,

you're brilliant. So the rule is, if the word directly after the relative pronoun

THAT, WHICH WHO or WHERE is a pronoun or a noun you can omit it

if the word directly after the relative pronoun is a verb or [it precedes] a preposition you can't

omit it. Yes it's that simple. If you want to express it another way,

if the relative pronoun is not the subject of the relative clause you can omit it,

that's fine. However, I do think for most people, including myself, it's easy if you just look at

the word after the relative pronoun and if it's a verb or [it precedes] a preposition you need

it but if it's a pronoun or noun you can rub it out and by the way omitting the relative pronoun

in this way is perfectly correct both in formal and informal English. Back to prepositions, if

the relative pronoun is preceded by a preposition you cannot omit it. However, this can only be with

WHICH or WHOM. THAT or WHO cannot be used after a preposition. Let's look at an example: “The chair

on which I'm sitting is broken.” you cannot omit WHICH because it is preceded by a preposition

“The table on which I'm sitting it's broken”. However, as we saw earlier,

ON WHICH can be changed to WHERE “the chair where I'm sitting” okay if you want to have

the same phrase but without the relative pronoun you can still do it how do you think?

put the preposition at the end of the clause then you can omit the relative pronoun

WHICH would be in this case “The chair I'm sitting on” or “the chair that I'm sitting on.”

okay it works in a similar way with WHOM and WHO “the girl from whom

I got this doughnut” okay WHOM cannot be omitted it's after preposition FROM WHOM so how can I

rewrite the sentence and omit the relative pronoun what do you think? Pause the video if necessary

Yes you're brilliant, put the preposition at the end and change WHOM to WHO

”The girl who I got this doughnut from.” but now we can omit the relative pronoun because it comes

before the pronoun “The girl I got this doughnut from.” Can I say “the girl from who I got this

doughnut”? No you can't never put WHO after a preposition you must put it at the end. Can I say

the girl whom I got this doughnut from.”? Grammatically, yes but stylistically, no,

if you insist on using WHOM then keep it next to the preposition otherwise you get what's called a

dangling preposition which is perfectly fine in English most of the time and even preferred but

not after WHOM. No don't dangle your prepositions after WHOM I'm warning you. Thank you grammarians

I'm off to eat doughnuts now and I suggest you do likewise see you in the next video