Use of which

Vignesh.4384 · Posted: Sat Sep 06, 2008 10:32 pm Post subject: Use of which

Hi,

I had been thinking that which can be only used to modify the non that preceeds it but there are exception i guess.

The attachment shows a sentence where which is used to refer to a noun but not the immediate noun preceeding it.

Please share your thoughts.

Vignesh.4384 · Posted: Sat Sep 06, 2008 11:30 pm Post subject:

Can which also refer to a non-noun?

In this attachemnt which refers to the subject of the phrase before.
I have read that this sentence is correct too.

confused

codesnooker · Posted: Sun Sep 07, 2008 12:26 am Post subject: Re: Use of which

Vignesh.4384 · Posted: Sun Sep 07, 2008 2:06 am Post subject: Re: Use of which

codesnooker · Posted: Sun Sep 07, 2008 2:13 am Post subject: Re: Use of which

Stacey Koprince · Posted: Mon Sep 08, 2008 6:17 am Post subject:

Just a technical point. As much as possible, type stuff out instead of using jpgs or other image files. When we hit reply, image files don't show up in the list of previous posts at the bottom of the reply page, so we can't easily refer back to the problem. I have to keep going back and forth in my browser window, which takes more time - and the more time we take to answer one question, the less time we have to answer other questions. Thanks!

There are some circumstances in which the word "which" does not refer to the immediately preceding noun, but it still refers to the immediately preceding MAIN noun.

He admired her aura of invincibility, which made her seem like Superwoman.

Here, the "which" clause is referring to aura, the main preceding noun. "of invincibility" is just a small descriptive phrase attached to aura.

When this does happen on the GMAT, the intervening prepositional phrase tends to be pretty short - maybe 5-6 words max. I don't recall seeing one like the canoe example, in which there are actually two descriptive phrases, not just one, and there are a lot of words between the main noun and the "which."

Do you know the source for that question? I really don't recommend using materials from sources other than OG and any companies large enough to spend a lot of money on R&D for sentence correction. For everything, really, but for verbal in particular - it's REALLY hard to mimic verbal stuff and the GMAT doesn't test every possible permutation of the grammar rules, so you don't want to waste time learning what the GMAT doesn't test, or learning things that will cause you trouble with the way that GMAT does test things.

The "exam" example given is not correct usage of "which." That may sound okay to a lot of people, because we speak that way every day. It's just not actually proper grammar.

lunarpower · Posted: Thu Sep 18, 2008 1:08 am Post subject:

Vignesh.4384 · Posted: Sat Sep 20, 2008 4:41 am Post subject:

Thanks Stacey and Ron

@Stacey : I fond that canoe eg in one of the pdf called amateur's approach to GMAT SC.

My intention was to know if "which" could be used in a sentence to modify a phrase.

I am posting another official GMAT prep question that uses which to modify a phrase. The OA here is D but i think the OA is using which to modify a phrase rather than any noun right?

Please share your comments

Regards,
Vignesh

Stacey Koprince · Posted: Sat Sep 20, 2008 4:03 pm Post subject:

When possible (and it's pretty much always possible with SC), please retype the text of the question rather than posting an image. When we reply, the image doesn't show up in the list of posts at the bottom, so we can't actually see the problem while we're replying. We have to keep going back to the page and then forward to our reply - this takes longer and means we can't answer as many questions.

In this case, you could use "which" to refer to the term "social wasps." The stuff after the which describes what it means to call them "social" wasps instead of just regular wasps. You wouldn't say "which means that" though - you'd just say "...social wasps, which live in a highly cooperative society..."

I have serious doubts about D as the official answer here. That leaves you with a list of three items consisting of:
"their society is (1) highly cooperative, (2) organized, and (3) it is almost entirely females"

That's obviously not parallel, first of all, and second, we'd say the society is "almost entirely composed of females," or "almost entirely female," but not "almost entirely females."

You said this is a GMATPrep question but the image you posted does not look like a screen shot from the GMATPrep software, which leads me to believe you got it from some other web site somewhere that says it's a GMATPrep question? I've seen web sites do this with (a) GMATPrep questions that have been improperly transcribed, and (b) with questions that are not actually GMATPrep questions (even though they've been labeled as such).

Be really careful where you get your material. As far as this one, I can find errors in A, C, D, and E. B looks fine.

lunarpower · Posted: Sat Sep 20, 2008 4:13 pm Post subject:

i think this is a real question.
and if it's not, it's a fine rendition; the style of this question (the "social wasps" question) is very reminiscent of the way authentic gmat problems are written.

the answer is definitely b; the problems in the other answers are fundamental and fatal.
the big roadblock here, as discussed in the link below, is thinking of "social wasps" and "wasps" as different words. there's no redundancy - you just have to learn to view "social wasps" (a new term being defined) as not a repetition of "wasps".

check out the following discussion from my other forum:
http://www.manhattangmat.com/forums/post10963.html

Stacey Koprince · Posted: Sat Sep 20, 2008 4:25 pm Post subject:

Yeah, I agree it seems like a well-written question (but with B as the answer, not D). I should've made my point more clear: even if a site is telling the truth when it says it's a GMATPrep question, the question text or the answer could still be improperly transcribed. This isn't the first time I've seen this. And then you find yourself in a situation in which you sit there trying to learn a "rule" that isn't really a proper rule - and you mess up your studying.

So just be careful where you get this stuff. If you're to the point where you're looking at GMATPrep stuff online, then you might as well just go use the software to take another test. Sure, you may get some repeats, but at least you know you're getting the official stuff from the source, without errors inserted by others.

Vignesh.4384 · Posted: Sat Sep 20, 2008 10:59 pm Post subject:

Thanks Stacey and Ron.

@ Stacey : i just forget that it becomes easier for u to read when the qestion is typed . Will remember to type next time.