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English 1b3 Posted 15 years ago
Grammar

Antecedents, dangling modifiers and more

I think this scene implies the murder on the 03/011/98 happended before the fight (occurred), both of which happened before he was labelled criminally insane.

We can safely assume readers will know which nouns the relative pronoun 'which' refers to.

But a sentence being free from ambiguity (or close to it) doesn't mean the sentence shouldn't be recast (a case in point being some sentences exhibiting dangling modifiers):

After reading the original study, the article remains unconvincing.

So would we accept the sentence in bold, even though there are three nouns (not two) that 'which' could refer to?

I say yes--I hope I haven't wasted your time with this Emotion: smile

Thank you
  

Top answer

I think this scene implies the murder on 03/011/98 happened before the fight (occurred), both of which happened before he was labelled criminally insane. So would we accept the sentence in bold, even though there are three nouns (not two) that 'which' could refer to? -- I don't see that there is any multiplicity of nouns that 'which' can refer to.

— Mister Micawber

  • I think this scene implies the murder on 03/011/98 happened before the fight (occurred), both of which happened before he was labelled criminally insane.
  • So would we accept the sentence in bold, even though there are three nouns (not two) that 'which' could refer to?
  • -- I don't see that there is any multiplicity of nouns that 'which' can refer to.
  • 'Both' takes care of that: 'murder' and 'fight'.
  • Surely you don't think it could refer to 'scene' either grammatically or logically?
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3 Answers
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I think this scene implies the murder on 03/011/98 happened before the fight (occurred), both of which happened before he was labelled criminally insane.

So would we accept the sentence in bold, even though there are three nouns (not two) that 'which' could refer to?-- I don't see that there is any multiplicity of nouns that 'which' can refer to. 'Both' takes care of that:
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Mister MicawberI think this scene implies the murder on 03/011/98 happened before the fight (occurred), both of which happened before he was labelled criminally insane.

So would we accept the sentence in bold, even though there are three nouns (not two) that 'which' could refer to?-- I don't see that there is any multiplicity of nouns that 'which' can refer to.
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The more I think about it though, I realise there is often going to be countless nouns in a sentence, and in such instances we are not forced to recast the sentence...-- Yes.
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