the girl who/whom I saw

[domingoolivares]

Buenas,

En los siguientes ejemplos me gustaría saber si es intercambiable el "whom" por el "who" y si signifaría lo mismo?

- She is the girl whom/who I saw at the party last night
- The woman whom/who you saw yesterday is my teacher
- The boy whom/who the policemen rescued from the boat was terrified

Gracias,

 

[Vicario]

Buenas,

En los siguientes ejemplos me gustaría saber si es intercambiable el "whom" por el "who" y si signifaría lo mismo?

- She is the girl whom/who I saw at the party last night
- The woman whom/who you saw yesterday is my teacher
- The boy whom/who the policemen rescued from the boat was terrified

Gracias,

Si quieres hablar bien y dar una buena impresión en Inglaterra, usarías 'whom' en tus frases. Son complementos directos del verbo (the policeman rescued the boy etc.). Es una lástima que 'whom' desaparezca poco a poco de la lengua hablada y que casi todo el mundo diría 'who'. Pero 'whom' es correcto.

 

[Borges]

You use who when you are referring to the subject of a clause and whom when you are referring to the object of a clause. She is the girl who ...
The woman whom you saw ...
The boy whom the policeman rescued....

 

[Borges]

Vicario, I think the first one is who not whom. I'll just say that for native speakers these are VERY often gotten wrong. Unfortunately, I can't exclude myself from the
error prone.

 

[domingoolivares]

Pero entonces, como aclaración ¿estarían bien expresadas las tres frases con "who"?

 

[Vicario]

Pero entonces, como aclaración ¿estarían bien expresadas las tres frases con "who"?

 

[Vicario]

No. Si quieres hablar/escribir bien, usa 'whom'.

 

[Borges]

Pero entonces, como aclaración ¿estarían bien expresadas las tres frases con "who"?

No. I believe the last two require "whom". I will say again however, that very few Americans would even notice in spoken speech if you say "who" in all three sentences. Maybe more native speakers can chime in here but if you say "whom" in spoken speech it almost draws your attention and you think "Wow, they are speaking very grammatically."

 

[Vicario]

No. I believe the last two require "whom". I will say again however, that very few Americans would even notice in spoken speech if you say "who" in all three sentences. Maybe more native speakers can chime in here but if you say "whom" in spoken speech it almost draws your attention and you think "Wow, they are speaking very grammatically."

 

[Vicario]

No. All three require 'whom'. I thought you liked Downton Abbey over there! It's that kind of context you might hear it in most, but it is correct, honestly.

 

[St. Nick]

If the relative clauses were non-restrictive, e.g., 'The boy, whom the police had rescued from the boat, was terrified,' the use of "whom" would be easier to digest. But, because all three of the relative clauses are restrictive in your examples, the pronoun "whom" ends up sounding clumsy. Employing the relative pronoun "that" makes life a lot easier when the subject of the sentence plays both a subjective and an objective role within the same structure.

 

[Borges]

No. All three require 'whom'. I thought you liked Downton Abbey over there! It's that kind of context you might hear it in most, but it is correct, honestly.

Ooops! I think you are right.

 

[Vicario]

Yes, you're right.

 

[Vicario]

Yes, you're right.

I meant that "that" would sound more natural. I'm now waiting for someone at Downton to say 'gotten'.

 

[Istriano]

The normal practice in modern English is to use who instead of whom (and, where applicable, to put the preposition at the end of the sentence): who do you wish to speak to?; who do you think we should support? Such uses are today broadly accepted in standard English.

Source: Oxford Dictionary of English
http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/who?region=uk#who__10

Whom is a more formal word than who and is not commonly used in ordinary speech and writing, where it can seem awkward and unnatural.

Source: Merriam Webster's Learner's Dictionary


http://www.learnersdictionary.com/search/whom

 

[Jim2996]

Dear dominoolivares,
Let me approach it this way. Do you understand the difference between "they" and "them" as in

They gave them the book. or
They gave it to them.

It's the difference between subject/object. It's also the same difference with

Who gave whom the book? or
Who gave it to to whom?

It's really not that difficult—except few native speakers make this distinction. Perhaps it was a distinction that was once made, at least by educated speakers. Perhaps is is one of those distinctions that the grammar police once tried to enforce (the war is now obviously lost). Perhaps it's a distinction that is worth making. For some, it is a distinction that can be made when useful, but nothing is worst than using "whom" when "who" is the correct choice, at least for us with sensitive ears.

Regarding your specific sentences.

She is the girl whom I saw. (Answers the question Whom did you see?)
She is the girl who saw me. (Who saw you?)

She is the girl who I saw. (Most everyone accepts this as standard, or, at least, everyday usage.)
*She is the girl whom saw me. (Ouch!!!, this hurts my ears.)

I also want to second St. Nick's suggestion that you use "that." "Whom" can sound either snobbish or educated, depending on your listener.

 

[Wandering JJ]

As St Nick wrote, the best option is 'that' rather than 'whom', since the clauses are all limiting (restrictive).

 

[inib]

And another option is to completely omit the relative pronoun. (She's the girl I saw.../The woman you saw.../The boy the policeman rescued...) I find this totally acceptable, but I suppose some natives will object.

 

[Wandering JJ]

And another option is to completely omit the relative pronoun. (She's the girl I saw.../The woman you saw.../The boy the policeman rescued...) I find this totally acceptable, but I suppose some natives will object.

This native agrees with you completely.

 

[Vicario]

This native agrees with you completely.

So does this one, although just because some rules aren't obeyed doesn't make them disappear!

 

[Amante]

One of the few times that whom is used these days is : the person with whom I was speaking, but you could just as easily say the person I was speaking with. It's easier and far more commonly used.

 

[Wandering JJ]

One of the few times that whom is used these days is : the person with whom I was speaking, but you could just as easily say the person I was speaking with. It's easier and far more commonly used.

Remebering, of course, that 'speak with' is North American usage; 'speak to' is British English.

 

[FromPA]

Si quieres hablar bien y dar una buena impresión en Inglaterra, usarías 'whom' en tus frases. Son complementos directos del verbo (the policeman rescued the boy etc.). Es una lástima que 'whom' desaparezca poco a poco de la lengua hablada y que casi todo el mundo diría 'who'. Pero 'whom' es correcto.

It’s not a shame at all. It’s just way too hard to figure out the grammatical analysis on the fly while you are speaking. The only time I might use whom is immediately following a preposition (my personal usage rule). I only bother to do the analysis in formal writing.

 

[Forero]

Whom is objective case. Modern English has no accusative, dative, instrumental, prepositional, or ablative case.

Whom is appropriate for direct and indirect objects and for objects of prepositions. It is never appropriate as a subject.

In the sentences in #1, I would either omit the relative pronoun altogether or use whom.

 

[Wandering JJ]

Hi Forero,
OE had four cases: nominative, accusative, genitive and dative – no instrumental or prepositional (as found in Russian, for example) nor an ablative case (as in Latin, for example).
Just a reminder that, in BrE, grammarians prefer 'that' as the relative in #1 as it introduces a restrictive clause. In practice, as you also suggest, we would probably omit the relative pronoun in the examples given.

 

[Forero]

Hi Forero,
OE had four cases: nominative, accusative, genitive and dative – no instrumental or prepositional (as found in Russian, for example) nor an ablative case (as in Latin, for example).
Just a reminder that, in BrE, grammarians prefer 'that' as the relative in #1 as it introduces a restrictive clause. In practice, as you also suggest, we would probably omit the relative pronoun in the examples given.

If we are talking about Old English, I believe it did have an instrumental case originally.

But I was just saying that Modern English whom is objective case, suitable for any kind of object. It is not "dative".

 

[Wandering JJ]

If we are talking about Old English, I believe it did have an instrumental case originally.

Good point. By the time I was born, the instrumental case had largely merged with the dative case.