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I have heard both variant used:

  • I insist on that he does his homework now.
  • I insist that he does his homework now.

Which is correct?

Is the following sentence without prepositions grammatical?

  • I insist he does his homework now.
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    To the best of my knowledge, a that-clause cannot be a complement of a preposition. So I would say the first one is ungrammatical.
    – Mohd Zulkanien Sarbini
    Commented May 28, 2017 at 11:12
  • Yes, the final sentence is grammatical. or I insist on him doing his homework now.
    – TimR
    Commented May 28, 2017 at 11:35

2 Answers 2

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The form "insist on" is used with nouns and noun phrases; whereas "insist" alone is used to with finite clauses (clauses that can be sentences on their own).

For the three examples that you gave, two are grammatical:

  • I insist that he does his homework now.
  • I insist he does his homework now.

These are both okay, because "that" is usually optional when used to introduce a finite relative clause.

The other example is not:

  • I insist on that he does his homework now.

This is not grammatical because "that he does his homework now" is not a noun phrase. As in Tᴚoɯɐuo's example, you could turn the latter part of the sentence into a noun phrase with "I insist on him doing his homework now".

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I think it's

I insist that he do his homework now.

because we use subjunctive. or else:

I insist on him doing his homework now.

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    Can you give some sources to back that up and clarify how it adds to the existing answer?
    – mdewey
    Commented May 6, 2021 at 11:11

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