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Anonymous Posted 9 years ago
Grammar
What... happened
What do the police believe happened?
Is "What" a fused relative pronoun (a fronted one) and the subject of the verb "happened" in the question above?
Top answer
anonymous Is "What" a fused relative pronoun (a fronted one) In my opinion it is. It is not the subject of of the clause "What... happened".
- anonymous Is "What" a fused relative pronoun (a fronted one) In my opinion it is.
- It is not the subject of of the clause "What...
- happened".
- Again in my opinion, it is the head of the noun phrase which can be paraphrased as "the thing which happened" thus being the direct object of the verb "believe".
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2 Answers
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anonymousIs "What" a fused relative pronoun (a fronted one)In my opinion it is. It is not the subject of of the clause "What... happened". Again in my opinion, it is the head of the noun phrase which can be paraphrased as "the thing which happened" thus being the direct object of the verb "believe".
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What do the police believe happened?
No, this is not a fused relative construction. It doesn't mean 'Do the police believe that which happened?'
But you are right that "what" is the subject of the embedded "happened" clause.
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