People that are well informed know that bordeaux is a french

Question

People  that are well informed know  that bordeaux is a french place whose most famous export is the wine  which bears its name.

this is part of the modifier - exercise question on MGMAT.

The answer corrects the statement by replacing "that are well informed.." with "who are well..". AND. by switching the which in the last part of the sentence to THAT.

My query:
since there is no comma between wine and which in the original sentence, the which is an Essential modifier, so why change to that?

Can anyone, please throw some light on this? Many Thanks ..

sudish · Answer

Hi

Just to throw some light on the use of 'that' and 'which', both are used to introduce relative clauses. However, 'that' is used in case the clause is restrictive whereas 'which' is used when the clause in non-restrictive.

Now, coming back to the question, 'that are well ...' should refer to the noun preceding this, which in this case, is People. So 'that' should be replaced with 'who' as 'people' is a noun.
From the sentence, it is clear that ' ... bears its name' is restrictive and hence, as such, should be introduced with 'that' instead of 'which' which suits non-restrictive clauses better.

Hope this explains your dilemma.

Cheers!

devinawilliam83 · Answer

Thanks Sudish, could you please share an example of a restrictive and a non restrictive clause?

sudish · Answer

Got this sentence on the web which fits in our context nicely:

The store honored the complaints that were less than 60 days old.
This sentence means that the store honored only those complaints which were less than 60 days old and did not honor complaints which were more than 60 days old. Thus we have a restriction on the complaints addressed by the store, as put by the restrictive clause 'that were less than 60 days old'.

Now, let's look at a non-restrictive clause example.
The store honored the complaints, which were less than 60 days old.
Though this sentence looks similar to the one above, it has a different meaning. This sentence makes use of the non-restrictive clause 'which were less than 60 days old' to state that the store honored all complaints and the complaints it addressed were all less than 60 days old. This means that although the store expected complaints both less than or more than 60 days old, it did receive only complaints which were less than 60 days old. Thus the clause does not add more meaning to the sentence 'The store honored the complaints' and hence is non-restrictive.

Hope this cleared your doubt. If not, do let me know!

Cheers!

devinawilliam83 · Answer

That was very helpful Sudish. Thanks :-D

People that are well informed know that bordeaux is a french

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