Relative Clauses

1. RELATIVE CLAUSES.
*Defining relative clauses.
*Non-Defining relative clauses.
*Relative pronouns.
*Relative adverbs.

2. Defining relative clauses.
 Defining relative clauses.
Look at this sentence:
The woman who lives next door works in a bank.
‘who lives next door’ is a defining relative clause. It tells us
which woman we are talking about.
Look at some more examples:
Look out!There’s the dog that bit my brother.
The film that we saw last week was awful.
This is the skirt I bought in the sales.
Can you identify the defining relative clauses?They tell us
which dog, which film and which skirt we are talking about.

3.  We use relative clauses to give additional
information about something without
starting another sentence. By combining
sentences with a relative clause, your text
becomes more fluent and you can avoid
repeating certain words.

4. Non-Defining relative
clauses.
 Non-defining relative clauses.
Look at this sentence.
My grandfather, who is 87, goes swimming every day.
‘who is 87’ is a non-defining relative clause. It adds extra information to
the sentence. If we take the clause out of the sentence, the sentence
still has the same meaning.
Look at some more examples.
The film, which starsTom Carter, is released on Friday.
My eldest son, whose work takes him all over the world, is in Hong Kong at
the moment.
The car, which can reach speeds of over 300km/ph, costs over $500,000.
Non-defining relative clauses add extra information to sentences.

5. Relative pronouns.
 Relative clauses are usually introduced by
a relative pronoun (usually who, which, that,
but when, where and whoseare also possible)
With defining relative clauses we can
use who or that to talk about people.There is no
difference in meaning between these, though
'who' tends to be preferred in more formal use.
 She’s the woman who cuts my hair.
 She’s the woman that cuts my hair.

6. Relative adverbs.
 The relative adverbs where, when & why can
be used to join sentences or clauses.They
replace the more formal structure of
preposition + which used to introduce a
relative clause.
 This is the shop in which I bought my bike.
→This is the shop where I bought my bike.