Relative clauses and pronouns

In a nutshell

Relative clauses are types of subordinate clauses. They give extra information about a noun/noun phrase and are often separated by commas.

Relative clauses

Relative clauses come straight after the noun they are giving more information about a noun/noun phrase in a sentence. This is likely to be in the middle of the sentence and might be separated by commas, as in the following example.

Example


The fox,	*who* lost his shoes,	went parachuting.
	↑ this is the relative clause, separated by commas.

Relative pronouns

Relative pronouns are the words that introduce a relative clause. The relative pronoun "who" is highlighted in bold above. Below is a full list of relative pronouns. The one you'll pick will depend on the type of person/object you're describing.

who	which	that	when	where
for a person/people	for an object/idea	for an object (or person)	for a time	for a place

Examples


The dog	that ate the cake	is on the bus.


The school	*where* Rachael goes	is far away.

Remember that relative clauses might not always be embedded in the middle. They can simply be tagged on the end (separated by a comma):


The fox went skydiving,	*which* is a dangerous activity!