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ESL forum >
Grammar and Linguistics > Relative Pronouns
Relative Pronouns
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ronit85
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Relative Pronouns
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Hello to all of you, Can you please help me with adding a relative pronoun to the following sentence and tell me why it is used. Sara and I both of ____________ are your sisters, love you . Thanks and have a wonderful day Ronit |
1 Dec 2015
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LadySaratoga
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Sara and I, who are both your sisters, love you.
Who should be put AFTER the subjects, Sara and I to make it clear which person or thing you are talking about.
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1 Dec 2015
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Homie67
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Hi, If you want to keep your sentence as it is, you need to use whom because it is complement of the preposition of. Not which because the subject is human; not who because it would sound too strange...and grammatically incorrect. Sara and I, both of whom are your sisters, love you. |
1 Dec 2015
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mjpa
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I agree with Homie 67: both of whom. (object pronoun) |
1 Dec 2015
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Tapioca
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The trouble is that if the elicited answer is �Sara and I, both of whom are your sisters, love you. � then, as Homie showed, you also need to add the comma.
The bigger trouble is that this is a pretty weird sentence. "Wait, you are my sisters?? How come I didn �t know that??" In real life we �d be more likely to say: "Look, Sara and I are your sisters. We love you." If my sister started using �whom � with me I �d think she �d taken the wrong pills. If you wanted to teach �both of whom � then I recommend getting some examples from this very interesting article about the Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy. Your students might learn how to use �whom �, you can find some real life examples and everyone can learn a very important lesson about correlation and causation which will make them much smarter people. :-) Some students (perhaps depending on their mother tongue) find learning the correct use of �whom � pretty difficult. That �s understandable because I would guess most native speakers don �t know how to use it either (the exception includes teachers, before you throw anything at me!). To be honest I don �t think I ever teach it because it �s a) so rarely used, and b) causes grammatical panic attacks. There �s a fantastic Oatmeal explainer on this by the way, if anyone is interested. The image below is just the beginning of it.
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1 Dec 2015
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Homie67
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Pretty clear :) I don �t teach it either, as it isn �t really used in oral speech. |
1 Dec 2015
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ronit85
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Thanks to all of you! I too found this sentence strange but as it was part of an exercise in my pupil �s book I tried to find an answer. |
1 Dec 2015
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