Timeline for With that or without "that", which one is more formal to write?
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| Nov 2, 2013 at 14:40 | history | edited | FumbleFingers | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Nov 2, 2013 at 14:33 | comment | added | user230 | It's good that you're trying to describe the usage you see. Unfortunately, you gave up too early and came to the conclusion that no descriptive rules could be found ("It's not really a matter of 'grammar' as such"). It is a matter of grammar, and you can find the descriptive rules in your grammar of choice; see e.g. The Syntactic Phenomena of English (2nd ed.) p.433: "One well-known restriction on internal syntax that applies only to bare relatives is that the gap may not be the main subject of the relative clause." | |
| Nov 2, 2013 at 14:33 | comment | added | user230 | The non-wh counterpart isn't always available, however, which makes the matter of omitting relative pronouns more complicated when you talk about them in general, rather than talking specifically about that (like we are in this question). For example, a wh-relative is required to represent adjuncts of place when the head noun doesn't suggest location. Here's an example from the same book: This is the web page where the claim was first made, not *This is the web page the claim was first made. | |
| Nov 2, 2013 at 14:32 | comment | added | user230 | These examples can be replaced with that-relatives, which are non-wh counterparts. In these examples, I'll indicate the location of the gap that's co-indexed with that explicitly: (1) some friends [that ____ saw her], (2) a key [(that) she found ____], (3) those books [(that) I referred to ____], (4) the day [(that) you were born ____], (5) a place [(that) you can relax ____], (6) the reason [(that) she got angry ____]. Parentheses around that indicate that it is optional; it is not optional when the gap is in subject position. | |
| Nov 2, 2013 at 14:32 | comment | added | user230 | Examples from A Student's Introduction to English Grammar, where the relativized elements are respectively: (1) a subject, (2) an object, (3) a complement of a preposition, (4) an adjunct of time, (5) an adjunct of place, and (6) an adjunct of reason: (1) some friends [who saw her], (2) a key [which she found], (3) those books [which I referred to], (4) the day [when you were born], (5) a place [where you can relax], (6) the reason [why she got angry]. | |
| Nov 2, 2013 at 13:49 | comment | added | user230 | No one is saying "that" = "correct", so there's nothing to take too far. That can be omitted when it's not a subject (as in the last example, where it's an object) or in some non-standard dialects. | |
| Nov 1, 2013 at 23:30 | history | answered | FumbleFingers | CC BY-SA 3.0 |