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Zuotengdazuo Posted 10 years ago
Grammar

Can I replace "which" with "that" in this sentence?

Usage of which/that in attributive clauses is always a tricky one for me. This time I stumble on this sentence which goes like this:

On the other hand, people in the West usually eat bread, milk, orange and coffee which are cold commonly.
This sentence comes from a cloze test, according to whose key the blanket should be filled out with "which".
My question is why we can't use "that" in place of "which" here? I think it makes no difference to the meaning ,whichever word we use.
Many thanks.
  

Top answer

The sentence is very odd. Could "cold" possibly be a mistake for "sold"?

— GPY

  • The sentence is very odd.
  • Could "cold" possibly be a mistake for "sold"?
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7 Answers
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The sentence is very odd. Could "cold" possibly be a mistake for "sold"?
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Err... I don't know. I doubt that it was written by a native speaker.Emotion: thinking
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... usually eat bread, milk, and coffee, which are commonly sold.

There are two kinds of relative clauses.

Restrictive. No comma. which OR that (or who, whom, or whose)
Non-restrictive. Comma. which BUT NOT that. (who, whom, and whose are OK.)

The exercise y
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Thank you, Mr. CJ. I knew the classification of relative clauses.
And I think the writer of this sentence intended to show a difference in food culture between west and east , where western people prefer to eat cold food, compared to eastern people who favor hot food. So I think the original sentence makes sense to some degree.
Supposing the original sentence makes sense(without a coma and
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zuotengdazuoI'm wondering if the meaning of the sentence will change if we replace "which" with "that"?
The problem is that I'm not sure what the meaning of the sentence is either with "which" or with "that", so I can't say if it will change. My guess is that the meaning will not change if the idea is that the sentence is referring to cold bread, cold milk, c
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CalifJimThe problem is that I'm not sure what the meaning of the sentence is either with "which" or with "that", so I can't say if it will change
I agree. I think the sentence as originally written is too odd to care about.
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Ok, I get you. Many thanks. So it doesn't make any difference to its meaning whichever word we use. And I agree with you; the sentence is too odd to bother with.
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