Carol,
I like Francis Christensen's explanation of the difference
between restrictive and nonrestrictive modifiers in his Notes
Toward a New Rhetoric. He uses the terms "defining" and
"commenting." And the lack of commas (with the
that-clause) means that the clause is defining--that is, pointing
out a particular lawnmower. He also says this:
A
restrictive modifier makes one statement and implies its
opposite.
In the case of your sentence (a): The opposite, implied,
statement is this: "The lawnmower that is not broken is not in
the garage." That is to say, the reader of (a) has the
right to infer that meaning. If that meaning is not
accurate--if, in fact, there is only one lawnmower--then the commas
are called for. And that means we need the which-clause.
(That-clauses are never set off by commas.)
Here's the restrictive/nonrestrictive lesson I use; it involves a
simple appositive, not an adjectival clause, but the principle is the
same. I put two sentences on the board:
My
husband, John, is a farmer.
My
son John is a student.
Then I ask the class what I have just told them about the size of
my family. The answer is that I have more than one son. In
other words, I have a son not-John who is not a student. I
usually add another comment to emphasize the message:
"If I were to tell my office partner, 'My husband is sick today,'
what would be his response?" The class usually comes up with
"Sorry to hear it" or "I hope he's not contagious"
or some other remark. Then I ask what my friend's response
would be to this statement: "My son is sick today." Of
course, his response would be "Which one?" In other
words, the noun phrase "my husband" has only one possible
referent; the referent of "my son" has not been
defined.
In the case of the that/which topic, it's safe to say that
"that clauses are never set off by commas";
which clauses, however, go both ways; a which-clause without
commas is equivalent to a that-clause. I prefer to make
the distinction, keeping which for non-restrictive (commenting)
modifiers. But that preference is far from universal.
Modern prose uses which-clauses both ways.
Martha
I'm not familiar with Fowler, but Strunk
& White say: "that is the defining, or restrictive
pronoun, which the nondefining, or nonrestrictive"
(87).
They give the following
examples:
a) The lawn mower that is broken is
in the garage.
vs.
b) The lawn mower, which is broken, is in
the garage.
Frankly, I don't see the difference. If
we are wondering which lawn mower is in question (ie. there are
several lawn mowers in the garage and only one is broken), one might
ask, "which one is broken?" And the owner of the lawn mowers
might say "that one is broken," or, "the one which is
broken is there." I don't really see the difference. Maybe
someone can explain.
Carol
Linda Di Desidero <[log in to unmask]>
wrote:
Hi, all
Here's a post that came through the WPA listserv on the origin of
'that/which' THAT I thought you might like.
Linda
-----------------------------------------------------
There's a new post on the Web of Language --
Happy Birthday, Henry Fowler: inventor of that/which rule is 150
on
Monday, March 10
March 10, 2008, is the 150th birthday of Henry Watson Fowler, high
school Latin teacher, lexicographer, and author of the Dictionary
of
Modern English Usage (1926), the most important book on English
usage
of the 20th century (sorry Strunk and White, you lose hands down).
So here's my e-card to the man who single-handedly invented the
difference between that and which and convinced thousands of copy
editors that Druids had carved it on an ancient pillar at
Stonehenge....
(picture here -- you have to go onlline to see it)
Actually, Fowler never hid the fact that he wasn't given the that/
which rule on Mt. Sinai. Quite the opposite: he insisted that
"the
relations between that, who, & which have come to us from
our
forefathers as an odd jumble, & plainly show that the
language has
not been neatly constructed by a master-builder" (Modern
English
Usage, 1926, that, s.v.; I'm not going to recount Fowler's rule
here,
because it's too complicated, requiring a discussion of
restrictive
and nonrestrictive clauses that's not particularly entertaining).
So Fowler decided to improve this jumble because, as he put it,
"the
temptation to show how better use might have been made of the
material to hand is sometimes irresistible."....
Read the rest at the Web of Language
DB
Dennis Baron
Professor of English and Linguistics
Department of English
University of Illinois
608 S. Wright St.
Urbana, IL 61801
Linda Di Desidero, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Assistant Academic Director of Writing
University of Maryland University College
3501 University Boulevard, East
Adelphi, MD 20783
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