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Main article: English relative clauses
In English, a relative clause follows the noun it modifies. It is generally indicated by a relative
pronoun at the start of the clause, although sometimes simply by word order. The choice of
relative pronoun, or choice to omit one, can be affected by whether the clause modifies a
human or non-human noun, by whether the clause is restrictive or not, and by the role
(subject, direct object, or the like) of the relative pronoun in the relative clause. In English, as
in some other languages (such as French; see below), non-restrictive relative clauses are set
off with commas, but restrictive ones are not:

I met a man and a woman yesterday. The woman, who had a thick French accent, was
very pretty.

I met two women yesterday, one with a thick French accent and one with a mild
German one. The woman who had a thick French accent was very pretty.
As regards relative clauses, English has two particularities that are unique among the
Germanic languages:
1.
In other Germanic languages, if a relative pronoun is the object of a preposition in the
relative clause, then the preposition always appears at the start of the clause, before the
relative pronoun. In English, the preposition will often appear where it would appear if the
clause were an independent clause — in other words, the relative pronoun "strands" it when it
moves to the start of the clause. It used to be common to regard this as a grammatical error
(see: Linguistic prescription) but in fact it has been a standard feature of the language since
Middle English times.
2.
In other Germanic languages, a relative pronoun is always necessary. In English,
however, it may be suppressed in a restrictive clause (as in "The man we met was very
friendly"), provided it would not serve as the subject of the main verb. When this is done, if the
relative clause is the object of a preposition in the relative clause, then said preposition is
always "stranded" in the manner described above; it is never moved to the start of the clause.
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English relative clauses
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This article is focused mainly on usage of English relative clauses. For theoretical background
on the subject, see the main article on relative clauses.
The relative pronouns in English include who, whom, whose, which, and that. (Note: Not all
modern syntacticians agree that that is a relative pronoun.) What is a compound relative,
including both the antecedent and the relative, and is equivalent to that which; for example, "I
did what he desired" means the same as, "I did that which he desired."
In some contexts, there may be a choice between two or more of these forms. The choice of
relative pronoun may carry additional meaning or draw a number of distinctions.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_relative_clauses
A relative clause is a subordinate clause that modifies a noun. For example, the noun phrase
the man who wasn't there contains the noun man, which is modified by the relative clause
who wasn't there. In many languages, relative clauses are introduced by a special class of
pronouns called relative pronouns; in the previous example, who is a relative pronoun. In
other languages, relative clauses may be marked in different ways: they may be introduced
by a special class of conjunctions called relativizers; the main verb of the relative clause may
appear in a special morphological variant; or a relative clause may be indicated by word order
alone. In some languages, more than one of these mechanisms may be possible.
The antecedent of the relative clause (that is, the noun that is modified by it) can in theory be
the subject of the main clause, or its object, or any other verb argument. However, many
languages do not have the possibility, or a straightforward syntactic pattern, to relativise
arguments other than the core ones (subject and direct object).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relative_clause
Understanding and using relative clauses
Using relative clauses often causes considerable concern for non-native speakers of English
– so much so that they are often avoided completely. But they exist for an important reason;
in English you cannot pre-modify important nouns very much – that is, you cannot place
complex modifications before the noun. You have to put such modifications after the noun –
and that is what relative clauses are for. In some languages, and Chinese is one, you can
pre-modify a noun in an extensive and complex way but this is not possible in English as the
following example shows:
Key noun
People
relative clause
main clause
who live in downtown
are often very poor.
areas
The Chinese transliteration of this would be:
Adjectival clause
key noun
Live in downtown
people
areas
complement
often very poor.
Avoiding the use of relative clauses in your writing will limit you to simple structures which
are unlikely to be adequate to express complex ideas and which will detract from the overall
style of your writing.
Relative clauses usually begin with the pronouns who, that, and which. These pronouns refer
back to the key noun in a sentence. Look at the example:
Standard sentence: We call this fruit a lemon
Sentence with relative clause: This is the fruit that we call a lemon.
However, when the relative noun is not the subject of the relative clause, the pronoun is
normally omitted. You can see that we is the subject of the relative clause, so it’s possible to
omit the pronoun:
This is the fruit we call a lemon.
A clause with a deleted relative pronoun is known as a ‘contact’ clause.
'That' is usually less formal than who, which, etc.
For more information on relative clauses, see Murphy, R. (1988). English Grammar in Use.
Cambridge: C.U.P. Look in Units 88 - 92. This book is available in CILL on the Grammar
Shelf at Intermediate level.
Exercises: http://elc.polyu.edu.hk/CILL/eap/relativeclauses.htm
How To Use A Relative Clause
Use relative clauses to provide extra information. This information can either define
something (defining clause), or provide unnecessary, but interesting, added information
(non-defining clause).
Relative clauses can be introduced by:



a relative pronoun: who (whom), which, that, whose
no relative pronoun, Ø.
where, why and when instead of a relative pronoun
You need to consider the following when deciding which relative pronoun to use:



Is the subject or object or possessive of a relative clause?
Does it refers to a person or an object?
Is the relative clause a defining or non-defining relative clause?
NOTE: Relative clauses are often used in both spoken and written English. There is a
tendency to use non-defining relative clauses mostly in written, rather than in spoken,
English.
Defining Relative Clauses
The information provided in a defining relative clause is crucial in understanding the
meaning of the sentence.
Example: The woman who lives in apartment No.
The document that I need has 'important' written at the top.
34
has
been
arrested.
The purpose of a defining relative clause is to clearly define who or what we are talking
about. Without this information, it would be difficult to know who or what is meant.
Example: The house is being renovated.
In this case it is not necessarily clear which house is being renovated.
Non-defining Relative Clauses
Non-defining relative clauses provide interesting additional information which is not
essential to understanding the meaning of the sentence.
Example: Mrs. Jackson, who is very intelligent, lives on the corner.
Correct punctuation is essential in non-defining relative clauses. If the non-defining relative
clause occurs in the middle of a sentence, a comma is put before the relative pronoun and
at the end of the clause. If the non-defining relative clause occurs at the end of a sentence,
a comma is put before the relative pronoun.
NOTE: In defining relative clauses there are no commas.
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