Bintang D' Twinklestars

Definition:

        A dependent clause used as an adjective within a sentence. Also known as an adjectival clause or a relative clause.

     
        An adjective clause usually begins with a relative pronoun (which, that, who, whom, whose), a relative adverb (where, when, why), or a zero relative.

Avoid writing a sentence fragment.

   
    An adjective clause does not express a complete thought, so it cannot stand alone as a sentence. To avoid writing a fragment, you must connect each adjective clause to a main clause. Read the examples below.

Example :

·         Diane felt manipulated by her beagle Santana, whose big, brown eyes pleaded for another cookie.

·         Chewing with her mouth open is one reason why Fred cannot stand sitting across from his sister Melanie.

·         Growling ferociously, Oreo and Skeeter, Madison's two dogs, competed for the hardboiled egg that bounced across the kitchen floor.

The main relative pronouns are:

There are two main kinds of adjective clause:

1. Non-defining clauses

    Non-defining clauses give extra information about the noun, but they are not essential:

  -   The desk in the corner, which is covered in books, is mine.

Explanation: We don't need this information in order to understand the sentence. “The desk in the corner is mine” is a good sentence on its own — we still know which desk is referred to. Note that non-defining clauses are usually separated by commas, and “that” is not usually used in this kind of context.

2. Defining clauses

Defining clauses give essential information about the noun:

The package that arrived this morning is on the desk.

Explanation: We need this information in order to understand the sentence. Without the relative clause, we don't know which package is being referred to. Note that “that” is often used in defining relative clauses, and they are not separated by commas.

Examples:

·         "He who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe is as good as dead."

(Albert Einstein)

·         "Creatures whose mainspring is curiosity enjoy the accumulating of facts far more than the pausing at   times to reflect on those facts."

(Clarence Day)

·         "Among those whom I like or admire, I can find no common denominator, but among those whom I     love, I can: all of them make me laugh."

(W. H. Auden)

·         "Short, fat, and of a quiet disposition, he appeared to spend a lot of money on really bad clothes,         which hung about his squat frame like skin on a shrunken toad."

(John le Carré, Call for the Dead, 1961)

·         "Love, which was once believed to contain the Answer, we now know to be nothing more than an       inherited behavior pattern."

(James Thurber)

·         "The means by which we live have outdistanced the ends for which we live. Our scientific power has   outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men."
(Martin Luther King, Jr.)

·         "The IRS spends God knows how much of your tax money on these toll-free information hot lines       staffed by IRS employees, whose idea of a dynamite tax tip is that you should print neatly."

(Dave Barry)

·         "On I trudged, past the carefully roped-off breeding grounds of terns, which chirruped a warning         overhead."

(Will Self, "A Real Cliff Hanger," 2008)

·         "My brother, who was normally quite an intelligent human being, once invested in a booklet that           promised to teach him how to throw his voice."

(Bill Bryson, The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid. Broadway Books, 2006)

·         "It has been well said that an author who expects results from a first novel is in a position similar to that of a man who drops a rose petal down the Grand Canyon of Arizona and listens for the echo."

(P.G. Wodehouse, Cocktail Time, 1958)                                     

·         "Afterwards, in the dusty little corners where London's secret servants drink together, there was         argument about where the Dolphin case history should really begin."

(John le Carré, The Honourable Schoolboy, 1977)

·         "The man who first abused his fellows with swear words, instead of bashing their brains out with a       club, should be counted among those who laid the foundations of civilization."

(John Cohen, 1965).