GMAT語法知識點：Modifiers和Pronouns的故事

　　一、Position of Noun Modifiers 名詞修飾語的位置

要把nounmodifiers放到正確的位置，否則thesentence may have an illogical or ambiguous meaning,即句子會出現語意問題

Remember this rule: Place a NOUN and its MODIFIER as closetogether as possible—the closer, the better!

WRONG: A hard worker and loyal teamplayer, the new project was managed by Sue.

然而，Who is a hard worker and loyal team player? 不是the project! 所以這個句子illogical.

應該改為：A hard worker and loyal team player, Sue managed the new project.

在大多數情況下，名詞和它的修飾語應該緊挨着，然而有些情況，名詞和它的修飾語之間會有一些其他的'修飾語，如The box of nails, which is nearly full, belongs to Jean.

名詞box有兩個修飾語：of nails和which isnearly full，因為有兩個修飾語，必定有一個會不挨着名詞。然而要哪個修飾語緊挨着名詞呢?答案是，必要性修飾詞(essential adjectives)。

看下面兩個句子，哪個更好些?

Jim biked along an old dirt road toget to his house, which cut through the woods.

To get to his house, Jim biked alongan old dirt road, which cut through the woods.

什麼cut through the woods? The road. Modifiers should be as close as possibleto the nouns they modify.所以第二句更好，which緊挨着要修飾的名詞road。

　　二、Possessive Nouns Are Not Nouns! 所有格名詞不是名詞

如Happy about his raise, Bill's celebration included taking his friendsout to dinner. Happy修飾的是Bill而不是Bill'scelebration。從句子結構上看，句子想表達的意思是“Bill's celebration is happy about his raise.”語意illogically。

改為：Happy about his raise, Bill celebrated by taking his friends to dinner.

　　三、Noun Modifier Markers: Relative Pronouns名詞修飾語的標記：關係代詞

Noun modifiers (關係代詞) are often introduced byrelative pronouns such as the following: Which That Who Whose Whom Where When.

第一，上面的修飾詞，除了that以外經常是 nounmodifiers的marker. 如果that前面是名詞，that就是名詞的nounmodifier，如果that前面是動詞，that就引導了一個更加複雜的句型：subject–verb–THAT–subject–verb–object.

第二，who和whom必須修飾人，而其他的代詞不能修飾人，而whose可以除人以外的物，如The town whose watersupply was contaminated is near the steel factory.

第三，Which 或 whom 有時在介詞的後面，如： the canal throughwhich water flows; the senator(參議員)for whom we worked.

第四，where修飾名詞性的地方，如area,site, country, or city;然而where不能修飾“不明確的、隱喻的”地方，如condition, situation, case, circumstances, or arrangement.

Wrong: We had an arrangementWHERE he cooked and I cleaned.

Right: We had an arrangement INWHICH he cooked and I cleaned.

第五，when 能夠修飾 a nounevent or time, such as period, age, 1987, or decade.在這種情況下，when = in which.