Use of which

BREAKING: Target Test Prep releases Brand New 2026 On Demand GMAT prep course

Redeem

This topic has expert replies

Post new topic Locked

Previous Topic Next Topic

Vignesh.4384: Master | Next Rank: 500 Posts; Posts: 443; Joined: Sat Jun 28, 2008 6:33 pm; Thanked: 5 times

Use of which

by Vignesh.4384 » Sat Sep 06, 2008 10:32 pm

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.

Attachments

Quote

Source: Beat The GMAT — Sentence Correction | Sat Sep 06, 2008 10:32 pm

Vignesh.4384: Master | Next Rank: 500 Posts; Posts: 443; Joined: Sat Jun 28, 2008 6:33 pm; Thanked: 5 times

by Vignesh.4384 » Sat Sep 06, 2008 11:30 pm

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

Attachments

Quote

codesnooker: Legendary Member; Posts: 543; Joined: Fri Jan 18, 2008 1:01 am; Thanked: 43 times; GMAT Score:580

Re: Use of which

by codesnooker » Sun Sep 07, 2008 12:26 am

Vignesh.4384 wrote: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 preceding it.

Please share your thoughts.

I am not sure about my this concept, but IMHO, in the above sentence, phrase "about twenty feet long and two feet wide, with small ribs and rails of cedar" is used to describe Canoe. This extra description phrase should be considered as waste in the sentence and can be ignored to check pronoun reference errors, subject verb agreement errors etc.

So considering that I feel the author has used "which" correctly in the sentence.

Quote

Vignesh.4384: Master | Next Rank: 500 Posts; Posts: 443; Joined: Sat Jun 28, 2008 6:33 pm; Thanked: 5 times

Re: Use of which

by Vignesh.4384 » Sun Sep 07, 2008 2:06 am

codesnooker wrote:
Vignesh.4384 wrote: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 preceding it.

Please share your thoughts.
I am not sure about my this concept, but IMHO, in the above sentence, phrase "about twenty feet long and two feet wide, with small ribs and rails of cedar" is used to describe Canoe. This extra description phrase should be considered as waste in the sentence and can be ignored to check pronoun reference errors, subject verb agreement errors etc.

So considering that I feel the author has used "which" correctly in the
sentence.

Thank you.
But i wanted to be absoltely sure about the usage of which...
It seems to be tested very often in GMAT.

@codesnooker : What do think about the second sentence ??

Quote

codesnooker: Legendary Member; Posts: 543; Joined: Fri Jan 18, 2008 1:01 am; Thanked: 43 times; GMAT Score:580

Re: Use of which

by codesnooker » Sun Sep 07, 2008 2:13 am

Vignesh.4384 wrote:
codesnooker wrote:
Vignesh.4384 wrote: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 preceding it.

Please share your thoughts.
I am not sure about my this concept, but IMHO, in the above sentence, phrase "about twenty feet long and two feet wide, with small ribs and rails of cedar" is used to describe Canoe. This extra description phrase should be considered as waste in the sentence and can be ignored to check pronoun reference errors, subject verb agreement errors etc.

So considering that I feel the author has used "which" correctly in the
sentence.
Thank you.
But i wanted to be absoltely sure about the usage of which...
It seems to be tested very often in GMAT.

@codesnooker : What do think about the second sentence ??

I am sorry, I am not a verbal geek, so can't assert the statement with 100% surety. However, I am sure of extra description phrase and we can ignore it.

Regarding second statement, I searched a lot on Google, but didn't find clear usage of "which". However, somewhere it is written that it can used in case of prepositional phrase.

Quote

GMAT/MBA Expert

Stacey Koprince: GMAT Instructor; Posts: 2228; Joined: Wed Dec 27, 2006 3:28 pm; Location: Montreal, Canada; Thanked: 639 times; Followed by:694 members; GMAT Score:780

by Stacey Koprince » Mon Sep 08, 2008 6:17 am

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.

Please note: I do not use the Private Messaging system! I will not see any PMs that you send to me!!

Stacey Koprince
GMAT Instructor
Director of Online Community
Manhattan GMAT

Contributor to Beat The GMAT!

Learn more about me

Quote

GMAT/MBA Expert

lunarpower: GMAT Instructor; Posts: 3380; Joined: Mon Mar 03, 2008 1:20 am; Thanked: 2256 times; Followed by:1535 members; GMAT Score:800

by lunarpower » Thu Sep 18, 2008 1:08 am

Stacey Koprince wrote:Do you know the source for that question?

flabbergastingly enough, i think the canoe problem is actually authentic gmatprep fodder. iirc, i remember seeing that problem against the familiar cyan and navy background that we all love to hate.

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.

here's the way you would actually write that:

"my brother got a 95 on his exam, a mark that surprised me given the..."

...or you could use a semicolon:
"my brother got a 95 on his exam; this mark surprised me because..."

neither of these is probably your favorite thing in the world, mostly because we don't talk this way. but you must get used to these sorts of constructions.
see problem #79 in the purple verbal og supplement for another problem in which the correct answer is formulated this way.
also see the non-underlined part of #59 in the same book ("a shortcoming that...") -- if this sentence were to be spoken out loud, most people would use "which" in the same way as you did above, but "which" can't be used to express that idea in the sentence.

Ron has been teaching various standardized tests for 20 years.

--

Pueden hacerle preguntas a Ron en castellano
Potete chiedere domande a Ron in italiano
On peut poser des questions Ã Ron en franÃ§ais
Voit esittÃ¤Ã¤ kysymyksiÃ¤ Ron:lle myÃ¶s suomeksi

--

Quand on se sent bien dans un vÃªtement, tout peut arriver. Un bon vÃªtement, c'est un passeport pour le bonheur.

Yves Saint-Laurent

--

Learn more about ron

Quote

Vignesh.4384: Master | Next Rank: 500 Posts; Posts: 443; Joined: Sat Jun 28, 2008 6:33 pm; Thanked: 5 times

by Vignesh.4384 » Sat Sep 20, 2008 4:41 am

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

Attachments

Quote

GMAT/MBA Expert

Stacey Koprince: GMAT Instructor; Posts: 2228; Joined: Wed Dec 27, 2006 3:28 pm; Location: Montreal, Canada; Thanked: 639 times; Followed by:694 members; GMAT Score:780

by Stacey Koprince » Sat Sep 20, 2008 4:03 pm

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.

Quote

GMAT/MBA Expert

lunarpower: GMAT Instructor; Posts: 3380; Joined: Mon Mar 03, 2008 1:20 am; Thanked: 2256 times; Followed by:1535 members; GMAT Score:800

by lunarpower » Sat Sep 20, 2008 4:13 pm

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:
https://www.manhattangmat.com/forums/post10963.html

Quote

GMAT/MBA Expert

Stacey Koprince: GMAT Instructor; Posts: 2228; Joined: Wed Dec 27, 2006 3:28 pm; Location: Montreal, Canada; Thanked: 639 times; Followed by:694 members; GMAT Score:780

by Stacey Koprince » Sat Sep 20, 2008 4:25 pm

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.