Exercises to learn English

Defining relative clauses

When you want to use a relative clause you need a relative pronoun or a relative adverb. Sometimes the relative pronoun can be omitted.

List of relative pronouns:

who / whom are used to refer to people: The man who lives upstairs is very noisy.
which is used to refer to things: The car which you bought last year is very fast.
that can be used to refer to people or things: The man that opened the door was tall. The novel that I am reading is very good.
whose is used to show who or what something belongs to or is related to: The novel that I am reading is about a woman whose husband dies in a car crash.

List of relative adverbs:

When can be used instead of (in / on which): I will always remember the day when (on which) they left.

Where can be used instead of (in / at which): They do not like the house where (in which) she lives.

Defining relative clauses are used to identify which person or thing we are talking about:

The man who is being greeted so warmly is the president of British Petroleum (BP).
If we said the man is the president of British Petroleum, nobody would probably know who we are talking about because there are four men in the picture.

When the relative clause defines the subject of another clause, the usual word order is broken and you find: Subj.+ relative clause + verb ...

The man who is being greeted is the president of British Petroleum (BP).

A relative pronoun, like most pronouns, can be:

the subject of a relative clause: The man who phoned a moment ago wanted to speak to Susan.

the object of a relative clause: The second-hand car which Paul bought last year has not broken down yet. (which is the object of bought)

when the relative pronoun is the object of the relative clause, it can be omitted: The second-hand car Paul bought last year has not broken down yet.

the complement of a preposition. When the relative pronoun is not omitted and placed after the preposition you can only use whom to refer to people and which to refer to things:

The boy with whom Jenny goes out is a very good sporstman.
The key with which I opened the back door yesterday is very rusty.

When the relative pronoun is the complement of a preposition, it can be omitted. Then the preposition must be placed at the end of the relative clause unless there is a time adverb. If there is a time adverb, the preposition is placed before the time adverb.

The boy Jenny goes out with is a very good sporstman.
The key I opened the back door with yesterday is very rusty.