To which...
"The purge has effectively destroyed Grace Mugabe’s “G40” faction within the party, and underlines the degree to which Mugabe’s overthrow has been driven as much by competition for power within the Zanu-PF as popular anger at a dictatorial and corrupt regime." (The Guardian.)
Is to which Mugabe’s overthrow has been driven as much by competition for power within the Zanu-PF as popular anger at a dictatorial and corrupt regime a relative clause or is it a prepositional phrase in the sentence above?
Top answer
The purge has effectively destroyed Grace Mugabe’s “G40” faction within the party, and underlines the degree i [ to which i ] j Mugabe’s overthrow has been driven _____ j as much by competition for power within the Zanu-PF as popular anger at a dictatorial and corrupt regime ] . No, not a PP but a relative clause which contains a fronted PP. The PP consists of "to" +"which", but it is just the relative pronoun "which" that has "degree" as antecedent.
- The purge has effectively destroyed Grace Mugabe’s “G40” faction within the party, and underlines the degree i [ to which i ] j Mugabe’s overthrow has been driven _____ j as much by competition for power within the Zanu-PF as popular anger at a dictatorial and corrupt regime ] .
- No, not a PP but a relative clause which contains a fronted PP.
- The PP consists of "to" +"which", but it is just the relative pronoun "which" that has "degree" as antecedent.
- Although the PP is fronted, its grammatical position is later in the clause as complement of "driven", as indicated by the gap notation '___' .
- Note that the relative word and its antecedent are co-indexed with " i " and the PP position and its grammatical position are co-indexed with " j "
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The purge has effectively destroyed Grace Mugabe’s “G40” faction within the party, and underlines the degreei [to whichi]j Mugabe’s overthrow has been driven _____j as much by competition for power within the Zanu-PF as popular anger at a dictatorial and corrupt regime ].
No,
0
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