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OF - when do we use

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OF - when do we use

by andy123 » Mon Oct 05, 2009 6:03 am
Jamieson's proposal was rejected for several reasons, the chief among which was cost.
(a) same
(b) among which the chief was its cost
(c) the main one was cost
(d) the chief reason of which was its cost
(e) the chief of which was cost


When do we generally use "OF" in a sentence ???
Last edited by andy123 on Tue Oct 06, 2009 7:57 am, edited 1 time in total.
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by riteshbindal » Mon Oct 05, 2009 9:22 am
Dude, please underline the sentence properly. You have neither underlined it nor put A choice.
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by krazy800 » Tue Oct 06, 2009 12:59 am
IMO E

I think if we have several reasons, we say chief of the several reasons.

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by andy123 » Tue Oct 06, 2009 7:58 am
have underlined the sentence now...please help to provide the reason...:)


thanks...
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Re: OF - when do we use

by Stuart@KaplanGMAT » Tue Oct 06, 2009 10:51 am
andy123 wrote:Jamieson's proposal was rejected for several reasons, the chief among which was cost.
(a) same
(b) among which the chief was its cost
(c) the main one was cost
(d) the chief reason of which was its cost
(e) the chief of which was cost


When do we generally use "OF" in a sentence ???
There's no specific rule about when to use "of"; most prepositional use is idiomatic, which basically boils down to "use it when it's correct to do so". Not very helpful, but hey, that's English for you.

The prepositional phrase "of which" can be used in different situations. For example:

"The company of which I speak" and "four teams participated, one of which is from my home town".

The second example is similar to the question posted: we often use "of which" when referring to a subset of a bigger group.
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by ChrisHinkle » Tue Oct 06, 2009 11:02 am
Looks to me like the central issue here is the proper idiom for "chief". You don't want a chief "among" a group. You want a chief "of" a group. The chief of the tribe, not the chief among the tribe. So get rid of anything with among.
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