A relative clause is a type of dependent clause, which describes the noun that appears right before it. Relative clauses add extra information about that noun. Examples are shown in (1).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
(1) a. Jeg kender damen, som<\/strong> bor i det bl\u00e5 hus<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2019I know the lady, who lives in the blue house\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n b. Han elsker bilen, som<\/strong> han fik i julegave<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2019He loves the car, that he got as a christmas present\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n c. De kender stedet, hvor<\/strong> vi var p\u00e5 ferie<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2019They know the place, where we went on holidays\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n As the examples in (1) show, relative clauses can describe people (1a) and items (1b) as well as places (1c). Relative clauses start with a conjunction som<\/em>\/hvor<\/em> equivalent to English \u2019that\/which\/who\/where\u2019. Unlike other conjunctions, relative clause conjunctions simulatanously serve as subject or object, depending on which of those the relative clause refers to (relativizes).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Based on the examples in (1), it would seem that Danish and English coinside to a large extent when it comes to the structure and use of relative clauses, except that Danish makes no distinction between people (\u2019who\u2019) and items (\u2019that\/which\u2019) using just som<\/em> for both. However, certain grammatical facts and variation muddy the waters a great deal, creating trouble for learners of Danish. Both of these issues have to do with grammar, more specifically the difference between subject and object relative clauses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Som<\/em> vs. der<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n So far, we\u2019ve only looked at the conjunctions som<\/em> and hvor<\/em>, but there is also the conjunction der<\/em>, which has a more limited use, because it can only be used when subjects are relativized, not objects. So, examples (2a-b) are fine, but not (2c-d). (The asterisk (*) means non-grammatical).<\/p>\n\n\n\n (2) a. Jeg kender ikke kvinden, der<\/strong> danser med Jakob<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2019I don\u2019t know the woman, who\u2019s dancing with Jacob\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n b. Jeg vinker til drengene, der<\/strong> taler med manden<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2019I\u2019m waving to the boys, who\u2019re talking to the man\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n c. *Jeg kender ikke kvinden, der<\/strong> Jakob danser med<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2019*I don\u2019t know the woman, whom Jacob is dancing with<\/p>\n\n\n\n d. *Jeg vinker til den mand, der<\/strong> drengene taler med<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2019*I\u2019m waving to the man, whom the boys are talking to\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n A practical recommendation to avoid issues with using der<\/em> is to avoid it and always use som<\/em>. However, the learner of Danish must know, that som<\/em> and der<\/em> are used interchangeably when subjects are relativized, so (2a-b) might as well have used som<\/em> in place of der<\/em>, whereas (2c-d) would only have been grammatical with som<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Optionality of obejct RCs<\/p>\n\n\n\n Another issue with RCs that relativize objects, is that in this context, the conjunction is not obligatory. This means that examples (2c-d) could be correctly expressed as in either (3a-b) and (3c-d).<\/p>\n\n\n\n (3) a. Jeg kender ikke kvinden, som<\/strong> Jakob danser med<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2019I don\u2019t know the woman, whom Jacob is dancing with\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n b. Jeg vinker til den mand, som<\/strong> drengene taler med<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2019I\u2019m waving to the man, whom the boys are talking to\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n c. Jeg kender ikke kvinden, Jakob danser med<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2019I don\u2019t know the woman, Jacob is dancing with\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n d. Jeg vinker til den mand, drengene taler med<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2019I\u2019m waving to the man, the boys are talking to\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n But RCs that relativize subjects do not have the same optionality, as shown in (4).<\/p>\n\n\n\n (4) a. Jeg kender ikke kvinden, som<\/strong> danser med Jakob<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2019I don\u2019t know the woman, who\u2019s dancing with Jacob\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n b. Jeg vinker til drengene, som<\/strong> taler med manden<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2019I\u2019m waving to the boys, who\u2019re talking to the man\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n c. *Jeg kender ikke kvinden, danser med Jakob<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2019I don\u2019t know the woman, dancing with Jacob\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n d. *Jeg vinker til drengene, taler med manden<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2019I\u2019m waving to the boys, talking to the man\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n Note that English does not have this same restriction, which is why the translations in (4c-d) are not marked as ungrammatical.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The extension of place to include \u201dtemporal location\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n As mentioned above, the RC conjunction hvor<\/em> usually relativizes locations (remember (1c) stedet, hvor vi var p\u00e5 ferie<\/em> \u2019the place, where we went on holidays\u2019). However, this use can be used for locations in time as well, as shown in (5).<\/p>\n\n\n\n (5) a. Jeg husker det \u00e5r, (hvor<\/strong>) jeg boede hos min ven<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2019I remember that year (when) I lived with my friend\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n Det var i den tid, (hvor<\/strong>) dinosaurerne levede p\u00e5 jorden<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2019It was in the time, (when) dinosaurs lived on earth\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n As indicated by the parentheses in (5), these conjunctions are optional as they are in English. In addition to the structure in (5), you might also encounter the use of da \u2019when\u2019 instead of hvor (det \u00e5r, da<\/strong> jeg boede hos min ven<\/em>), but the use of hvor<\/em> is more common.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A relative clause is a type of dependent clause, which describes the noun that appears right before it. Relative clauses add extra information about that noun. Examples are shown in (1). (1) a. Jeg kender damen, som bor i det bl\u00e5 hus \u2019I know the lady, who lives in the blue house\u2019 b. Han elsker bilen, som han fik i julegave \u2019He loves the car, that he got as a christmas present\u2019 c. De kender stedet, hvor vi var p\u00e5 ferie \u2019They know the place, where we went on holidays\u2019 As the examples in (1) show, relative clauses can describe people (1a) and items (1b) as well as places (1c). Relative clauses start with a conjunction som\/hvor equivalent to English \u2019that\/which\/who\/where\u2019. Unlike other conjunctions, relative clause conjunctions simulatanously serve as subject or object, depending on which of those the relative clause refers to… L\u00e6s mere Relative Clauses<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":148,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-283","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dansk.ninja\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/283","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dansk.ninja\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dansk.ninja\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dansk.ninja\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dansk.ninja\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=283"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dansk.ninja\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/283\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":286,"href":"https:\/\/dansk.ninja\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/283\/revisions\/286"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dansk.ninja\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/148"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dansk.ninja\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}