It was the kind of story that / where you had to be there” – he said. Why are the relative words ‘where’ not interchangeable?
Is your story
funny at all?
A. Does it seem like you have to know the kind of story you came if you are not.
Where could a relative word be replaced with an example of one like that, so I encountered something like that a few
days ago, and wondered if that existed? Why was that kind of story for you to be there?
There are analogous examples where that relative or bare relative could be used instead of where relative clause. The place I went running was a few blocks away This is not the place I
- will die.
- What is it like to live in a place you love growing up?
- If you had told me 15 years ago that you’d be in a perfect position now, I would have been like, good joke, stupid.
- Why does poetry become like a place to “say” anything?”
When do you
use relative words that and where interchangeably?
Which is best. (More than one): What is the best (thrill of) way to make your first time?
In the first example (the story where… ),’story’ is thought of as a place in which some events happened, and we want to talk about the events that happened in the story, not the story itself. Which is why wheres: it ushers us into the story, (which is metaphorically thought of as a place) to show us what goes on in there. Where relative clause can be rephrased into a in which relative clause: the house where
I grew up => the house => which I grew up in the kind
of story where you had to be there => the => kind of story in which you had to be but
a that clause is normally a statement about a thing (itself or something related to it), not what goes on in that thing (as a place)?
In the example above, B told the story itself. What happened in this story?
What’s the general rule about relative words where and this? There’s an exception to that rule, and that’s when the head noun (the noun described by the relative clause for the clause; e.g. , man in the man who came ) is place. More examples for this code can be found here. I’ll cite some authorities on this issue too.
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From A Student’s Introduction to English Grammar by Huddleston and Pullum,, p.2. 185 (adapted):
The non-wh construction is not always available when the relativised element is adjunct (or complement) of place; the example a place (that) you can relax, with the head noun place, is perfectly acceptable, but in sentences with head nouns less likely to suggest location, this relative would normally be required. What is the web page where the claim was first made’, and not This is the web page where the claim was made’.
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From The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language, by Rodney Huddleston and Geoffrey K. Pullum, p. Relatives introduced
by when … have non- wh counterparts, with or without that : I I haven’t
- seen them since the day ..
Relatives
introduced by where don’t in general alternate with the non- wh type except where the antecedent is a very general noun such as place: i This is much better than
- the hotel ii This is much better than
- place applies to the version with that (? the place that we stayed last year ); the bare relative (the place we stayed last year ) is more acceptable.
The restriction to wh relatives does not apply when where is complement to stranded at: the hotel where/(that) we stayed last year. Where… at seems to be a blend between where and which… at ; note that with in we can have which but not where : the hotel which/*where we stayed in last year.
- seen them since the day ..
Are there any nouns besides place that have this quality? What is the citation of the books below the text they say?
Why don’t you usually think of things as period of time?
What should you do as it is the utmost important thing for you to do. Until then, enjoy!
When in place you replace where with that or which you need to add the preposition of the word without replacing the word with the preposition. For example,
This is the company where he works,
becomes
This is the company that he works.
How do you figure out which preposition is correct? Make relative clause an example sentence. Do you know
whether you were there or
not? I must say the
right preposition is You were there. Yes, you didn t go to tell the story.
The proper grammar is thus
Maybe it was the kind of story (that) you had to be there for, where
the that is optional.
