Relative Clauses

Intervenant

Laurence Petoud

Executive Assistant

Formatrice en Entreprise

ECDL Expert

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This support has been developed as part of my revisions for exams First Certificate in English.


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Relative clauses

Here are some examples of sentences without relative clauses:

Yesterday I met a man. He works in the circus. I bought a cell phone. It has internet access. There’s the restaurant. I ate at that restaurant last night.These sentences are correct, but they are very short and simple (and rather boring).Relative clauses help us link our sentences together and make them richer in detail: Yesterday I met a man who works in the circus. I bought a cell phone that has internet access. There’s the restaurant where I ate last night.

WORDS TO BEGIN RELATIVE CLAUSES

who (to describe people – subject)

The woman who works in the bank is my neighbour.

whom (to describe people – object)

My cousins, one of whom is a doctor, live in England.

whose (to describe possession)

The man whose car was stolen went to the police station.

that (to describe things – defining relative clauses)

I’m selling the computer that I bought in the U.S.

which (to describe things – non-defining relative clauses)

I’m selling this computer, which I bought three years ago, for $500.

when (to describe times)

My favorite season is fall, when all the leaves change color.

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A relative clause is a phrase that adds information to a sentence. All relative

clauses describe nouns


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where (to describe places)

I visited the neighborhood where I grew up.

why (to give a reason)

Do you know the reason why the stores are closed today?

whereby (by which means) – rather formal

The government has created an online system whereby citizens can give their feedback.

Sometimes we use that in place of who. It is more technically correct to use who, but in informal spoken English you might hear that instead.

The woman who works in the bank is my neighbour.

The woman that works in the bank is my neighbour.

I have a friend who owns a sailboat.

I have a friend that owns a sailboat.

Also, we often use who even when whom would technically be more correct:

There’s the man whom I met at the party.

There’s the man who I met at the party.

DEFINING AND NON-DEFINING RELATIVE CLAUSES

Relative clauses can be defining or non-defining. What exactly does this mean?

A defining relative clause includes information that is essential to the sentence. It specifies which one or what type of person or thing we are talking about. If we removed it, the sentence would make no sense or the meaning would change:

I hate dogs that bark all the time.

What type of dogs? Only dogs that bark all the time.

I hate dogs.

= ALL dogs

The person who scores the most points will win a prize.

Which person? The one with the most points.

The person will win a prize.

Which person? We’re missing some information!

That’s the house where my grandparents used to live.

That’s the house.


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This sentence doesn’t make sense by itself.

A non-defining clause adds extra information – often details that are secondary to the main message. If you remove a non-defining clause from a sentence, the basic message is still the same.

My brother, who lives in California, is an engineer.

My brother is an engineer.

We went to the closest beach, which was very crowded.

We went to the closest beach.

That café, where you can get free refills, is my favorite place to hang out.

That café is my favorite place to hang out.

As you can see from the examples, non-defining relative clauses are often enclosed

by commas. Defining relative clauses are never enclosed by commas:

Bob’s Furniture Store, where we bought our sofa, is going out of business.

The store where we bought our sofa is going out of business.

In the first sentence we say the name of the store specifically – so this already tells us which store we are talking about. “Where we bought our sofa” is therefore extra information, not essential information.

In the second sentence, we don’t name the store; we simply describe it as “The store where we bought our sofa.” This means that “where we bought our sofa” is essential information answering the question of which store we are talking about – so we do not enclose it in commas.

OMITTING “WHO” AND “THAT”

In some defining relative clauses, we can actually omit the pronouns who and that:

There’s the man who I met at the party.

= There’s the man I met at the party.

Here’s the information that you requested.

= Here’s the information you requested.

When can we do this? Only when the word being described by the relative clause is the receiver of the action in the relative clause. These examples will make it clearer:

There’s the man (who) I met at the party.

I met the man

There’s the man who helped me.


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the man helped

This is the table (that) we built.

we built the table

This is the table that cost $1000.

the table cost

PREPOSITIONS IN RELATIVE CLAUSES

When talking about things belonging to other things, we often use of which instead of whose:

That book, the end of which was very disappointing, was slammed by critics. There were over 200 years of slavery, the effects of which are still being felttoday.We can also use of which after quantity words like all, both, each, many, most,neither, none, part, some, a number, and superlatives: She doesn't spend much on her clothes, most of which are second-hand. I bought two toys, both of which are for my nephews. They made many attempts, none of which were successful.With people, we can use of whom: My neighbors, all of whom have lived here for years, are very friendly. The three kids, the oldest of whom was only 8, were home alone.In more formal written English, we try to avoid ending sentences with prepositions.We can use a preposition + which instead: That's the church we were married in. That's the church in which we were married. Art is a topic I know nothing about. Art is a topic about which I know nothing. Please work on the project you were assigned to. Please work on the project to which you were assigned.The exception is when the verb in the relative clause is a phrasal verb (take on,come across, look after, etc.) - then we cannot move the preposition before the mainverb. In a more formal context, we can replace the phrasal verb with a single verb of equivalent meaning: He did not believe the story that I'd made up. He did not believe the story up which I'd made. He did not believe the story that I’d invented.

Summary

Relative clauses add information to a sentence by providing additional detail about a person, place, or thing.


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They start with the words who, whom, whose, that, which, when, where, why, and whereby.A defining relative clause answers the question "Which one?" or "What type" and contains information that is essential to the sentence. A non-defining relative clause adds extra information (not essential). Nondefining relative clauses are enclosed in commas. When the person/thing being described is the receiver of the action in the relative clause, we can often omit the pronoun:o There's the man I met at the party.o Here's the information you requested. We can use of which when talking about things belonging to other things, and after quantity words and superlatives. In formal written English, we try to avoid ending sentences with prepositions, so we can use a preposition + which. Ex) That's the church in which we were married. We cannot do this with phrasal verbs, so we can replace the phrasal verb with a single verb of equivalent meaning.


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Relative Clauses