Who, That, or Which?

Limiting (defining) clause				Descriptive (non-defining) clause
	person	thing			person	thing
subject	who (or that)	that (or which)		subject	, who…,	, which …,
object	that	that		object	, who (or whom) …,	, which …,

Notes:

1. We can also use whom instead of who as an object, although whom is very formal:

e.g. She’s an actress whom most people think is at the peak of her career.

2. We use that as subject after every(thing), some(thing), any(thing), no(thing), only, words such as all, little, few, much and none used as nouns, and superlatives. Which is also used as subject after something and anything, but less commonly. We use that or zero relative pronoun as object after these:

e.g. These walls are all that remain of the city. (not: …all which remain…)

e.g. She’s one of the kindest people (that) I know. (not: …who I know.)

e.g. Is there anything (that) I can do to help? (rather than: … anything which I

can do…)

3. We can’t add a subject or object to the relative clause in addition to the relative pronoun:

e.g. The man who gave me the book was the librarian. (not: The man who he gave

me…)

Notice also that adding a pronoun to the main clause in addition to the relative clause is unnecessary, although it is found in speech:

e.g. A friend of mine who is a solicitor helped me. (or, in speech: A friend of mine who is a solicitor – she helped me.)

4. In limiting relative clauses (only!) which may refer to the whole sentence:

e.g. He turned on the television which looked new and expensive. [‘which’ refers to the television]

e.g. He turned on the television. I thought this was rather surprising. →

He turned on the television, which I thought was rather surprising.

[‘which’ refers to the action of turning on the television]

Exercises

1. Join each pair of sentences together to make one sentence with a relative clause, using who or which:

1. This is the man. I met him in Paris. 2. I wanted the painting. You bought it. 3. This is the chair. My parents gave it to me. 4. She’s the woman. She telephoned the police. 5. He’s the person. He wanted to buy your house. 6. We threw out the computer. It never worked properly. 7. This is the lion. It’s been ill recently. 8. The man was badly injured. He was driving the car. 9. The children broke the window. They live in the next street. 10. That’s the woman. I was telling you about her. 11. I know somebody. He deals with exports. 12. I want some plates. They can go in the microwave. 13. I was at school with the man. He is driving that taxi. 14. I’d like to speak to the person. He could mend that chair. 15. There’s some cheese in the fridge. It needs to be eaten. 16. We’ve got some light bulbs. They last for years. 17. This is the switch. It isn’t working.