Relative Pronoun - Variant Forms of Relative Pronouns

Variant Forms of Relative Pronouns

In some languages, such as German, Serbo-Croatian and Latin, which have gender, number, and noun declensions, the relative pronoun agrees with its antecedent in gender and number, while its case indicates its relationship with the verb in the relative or main clause. In some other languages, the relative pronoun is an invariable word.

The words used as relative pronouns are often words which originally had other functions: for example, the English which is also an interrogative word. This suggests that relative pronouns might be a fairly late development in many languages. Some languages, such as Welsh, do not have relative pronouns.

In English and German, different pronouns are sometimes used if the antecedent is a human being, as opposed to a non-human or an inanimate object (as in who/that).

(5) This is a bank. This bank accepted my identification.
(6) She is a bank teller. She helped us open an account.

With the relative pronouns, sentences (5) and (6) would read like this:

(7) This is the bank that accepted my identification.
(8) She is the bank teller who helped us open an account.

In sentences (7) and (8), the words that and who are the relative pronouns. The word that is used because the bank is a thing; the word who is used because "she" is a person.

Read more about this topic:  Relative Pronoun

Famous quotes containing the words variant, forms, relative and/or pronouns:

    “I am willing to die for my country” is a variant of “I am willing to kill for my country.”
    Mason Cooley (b. 1927)

    The poet’s eye, in a fine frenzy rolling,
    Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven;
    And as imagination bodies forth
    The forms of things unknown, the poet’s pen
    Turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing
    A local habitation and a name.
    William Shakespeare (1564–1616)

    Man may have his opinion as to the relative importance of feeding his body and nourishing his soul, but he is allowed by Nature to have no opinion whatever as to the need for feeding the body before the soul can think of anything but the body’s hunger.
    George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)

    In the meantime no sense in bickering about pronouns and other parts of blather.
    Samuel Beckett (1906–1989)