Thanks again, Martha and Bruce.  These explanations help a great deal.

Beth

>>> [log in to unmask] 3/9/2005 11:29:32 AM >>>
Beth,

I would add to Bruce's description of the two "that"s:  In the
relative clause, "that" has a slot to fill in the clause itself--that
of subject (and this is always true of the relative pronouns and
relative adverbs that introduce adjectival clauses: pronouns fill a
nominal slot or, in the case of the possessive "whose," a determiner
slot; relative adverbs function as an adverbial in the clause);  in
the nominal clause, "that" serves only as an introducer, a
nominalizer, with no function in the clause itself.   Students who
have learned traditional diagramming can picture the nominalizer
"that" hovering over the clause, like an outsider; they can picture
the relative pronoun firmly settled on or attached to the clause's
main line.

I call the relative-clause "that" a relative pronoun (I've learned
only recently that this term is debatable); I call the nominalizer
"that" an expletive, as many traditional grammarians do.

Martha





>Beth,
>
>I would like to mention how I approach this with my students.  This
>may help, though you seem to reach the same point another way.
>
>One function of an adjective is to identify the reference of a noun.
>The noun also can serve to help identify the reference of another
>noun.  This is the appositive.  By the same token the noun clause
>and the adjective clause can both have an identifying function.
>There are a good number of particular nouns that need further
>identification, and the noun clause is naturally used with them:
>fact, claim, rumor, statement, decision, idea, etc.  These all
>denote concepts which are potentially worded as sentences.  In such
>cases it is possible to express (redundantly) both functions
>(identifying adjective/statement) by repeating the connective
>"that."  Hence, "They espoused the belief that is that God exists"
>has two connectives.  The first "that" is the connective of an
>adjective clause (relative, pointing to "belief") and the second is
>the connective of the noun clause.  If you can build this redundant
>construction logically, then you have the appositive.
>
>Bruce
>
>>>>  [log in to unmask] 3/9/2005 7:45:48 AM >>>
>
>Thanks, everyone.  The "which" test does work on sentence 1, but not
>sentence 2.  Maybe we idiomatically prefer "the fact that . . . " or
>maybe I should have agreed that sentence 2 was an appositive?  I can
see
>that it's definitely an appositive in the sentence "That fact, that
they
>didn't like chocolate, surprised her"--but that's not the same
>sentence.
>
>Ultimately, I guess it doesn't matter that much.  These sentences
won't
>appear on any test--the students wrote the sentences for a different
>activity.  I can just agree that sometimes it's really hard to tell
what
>a clause is doing, just like it's sometimes really hard to tell what
a
>prepositional phrase is doing, and leave it at that.
>
>Thanks,
>
>Beth
>
>>Here are a couple of example sentences with the suspected
appositives
>>in brackets:
>>
>>1. The book, [that was titled 'Great Expectations',] was a classic.
>>
>>2. The fact [that they didn't like chocolate] surprised her.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>Beth Rapp Young
><http://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~byoung>http://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~byoung
>
>University of Central Florida
>From Promise to Prominence: Celebrating 40 Years.
>
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