Here is one example, Carol:

 

The classrooms, which were painted over the summer, were bright and cheerful.

 

(Translation: All the classrooms were painted, and they are all, therefore, bright and cheerful.)

 

The classrooms that were painted over the summer were bright and cheerful.

 

(Translation: Only some of the classrooms were painted, and the ones that were painted are bright and cheerful. The rest are not.)

 

It strikes me that although we are seeing the “which”/“that” distinction being used less and less often, many writers rely more and more on commas to indicate nonrestrictive information.

 

Frankly, I’m with Fowler: the distinction seems helpful to me—even critical for clarity—and I hate to see writers relying on punctuation to clarify meaning.  

 

P.S. Martha, thank you for that insight into the main reason the passive voice isn’t always the best choice.

 

Nancy

 

 

 

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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