When is it safe to use the word "that?"

Tame the CAT

Jessica Mitford wrote The American Way of Death, a best-selling book, that led eventually to an official investigation of the funeral industry.

A. that led eventually
B. that had led eventually
C. that eventually led
D. which led eventually
E. who eventually led

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This is one of the most confusing parts of sentence correction. When can you use the word "that" versus which, to, for, who or a bunch of other words?

I think the answer is D. I haven't looked at the solution yet. The reason I picked D is the sentence just flowed better. I'm still studying the rules, but just thought I would ask on this forum.

Thanks in advanced!!

rajesh_ctm · Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2007 7:51 am Post subject:

No idea which one is correct grammatically. Going just by the ears, C "sounds" most appropriate (familiar).

Please let us know the OA.

Tame the CAT · Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2007 2:15 pm Post subject:

D is correct. C sounds good as well.

I got lucky. I want to know why the answer is D. I took an online sentence correction quiz which only gives the answers, but not the reasons behind them.

jayhawk2001 · Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2007 3:11 pm Post subject:

Here's what I recall reading on "that" vs "which" --

"Which" is used in non-restrictive clauses (one that can be removed
without altering the meaning of the sentence).

"That" is used in restrictive clauses (where the meaning of the sentence
depends on the clause).

In the question, it appears that the official investigation is an integral
part of the sentence and hence should be introduced with a "that". This
leaves us with A or C. "eventually led" seems like a better construction compared to "led eventually".

So, C looks like a better option. Only snag is that there's a comma
before "that" which is usually not the case.

If the OA is D, I'll be interested in hearing why the last clause is
non-restrictive.

ashok_uddaraju · Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2007 7:15 pm Post subject:

here what led was the book so while referring to the book the apt option should be "which led" option D

amitamit2020 · Posted: Tue Mar 13, 2007 8:24 am Post subject: Expert comments

Any expert comments if the clause is restrictive or non-restrictive ..pl?

beatthegmat · Posted: Tue Mar 13, 2007 10:31 am Post subject: Re: Expert comments

800guy · Posted: Wed Mar 14, 2007 10:00 am Post subject: Re: Expert comments

jayhawk2001 · Posted: Wed Mar 14, 2007 5:11 pm Post subject: Re: Expert comments

Hmm, getting rid of "a best-selling book" clause, we have

Jessica Mitford wrote The American Way of Death that led eventually to an official investigation of the funeral industry.

The commas as I see it pertain to the non-restrictive clause
"a best-selling book", which makes the part introduced by "that"
a restrictive clause.

I'm just plainly confused :-)

Stacey Koprince · Posted: Mon Mar 19, 2007 8:57 pm Post subject:

The additional info about the investigation is just that - extra info. The basic sentence is "she wrote a book" and we can understand that without the extra info of what happened after the book was written. Since the additional info isn't essential to the basic meaning of the core subject-verb-object, we use "which" instead of "that."

Think of it this way.
You're driving down my street looking for my house and I tell you:
- I'm in the third house, which is red.
- I'm in the third house that is red.

The first sentence tells you to look for the third house, which also just happens to be red. You can still understand the core subject-verb-object (I'm in the third house) without that last bit (even though you would lose some meaning - that the house is red - if you chopped it out).

The second sentence tells you to look for the third red house, which may or may not be the third house overall. If the second sentence is true, I need to use the word "that" or you won't properly understand the core subject-verb-object (I'm in the third house) b/c I'm not just in the third house, I'm in the third red house.

(Of course, I haven't told you what side of the street I'm on, but we'll ignore that for now. Smile

)

If the sentence above really wanted to use "that" to make an essential modifier, it would basically be saying that there is more than one book by this title and so the sentence has to specify that she wrote the one that led to an official investigation etc. And that doesn't make sense.

Cybermusings · Posted: Tue Apr 03, 2007 5:08 am Post subject:

Thank you stacey