SC quiz bank

[kerlium78]

The Diary of Anne Frank tells the true story of a young girl and her family that were hidden during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands by a gentile Dutch couple, though they were eventually discovered.


that were hidden during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands by a gentile Dutch couple, though they were eventually discovered
that were hidden by a gentile Dutch couple during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands, though they were eventually discovered
whom a gentile Dutch couple hid during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands but were eventually discovered
who were hidden by a gentile Dutch couple during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands but were eventually discovered
who were hidden by a gentile Dutch couple during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands even though they were eventually discovered
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The original sentence uses the relative pronoun "that" where "who" is preferred because the antecedent is a group of people. Also, the prepositional phrase "by a gentile Dutch couple" is placed in such a way as to suggest that the occupation was carried out by the couple. Finally, the pronoun "they" is ambiguous - it could refer to the family or to the couple.

(D) CORRECT. It correctly uses the pronoun "who" to refer to a girl and her family. Additionally, the phrase "by a gentile Dutch couple" is placed immediately after "who were hidden" to clarify the meaning. Finally, the ambiguous pronoun issue is avoided altogether.
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as you can see the correct answer choice "D" states that the ambiquous prononoun issue is avoided altogether. can someone please teach me what does this mean? My doubt is how can we eliminate "they" and say that we have destroyed the pronoun problem? isnt it still confusing because the word "were" in the correct answer choice can refer to anybody!

[StaceyKoprince]

Good question - but, no, the verb "were" cannot take any subject. To match the subject, we have to take a look at the construction of the rest of the sentence.

"by a gentile Dutch couple" is a prepositional phrases. Prepositional phrases cannot contain the main subjects of sentences, so the "couple" is not a candidate to match with the verb "were."

The sentence also has parallelism:

AF and her family who <were hidden> BUT <were discovered>

The "but" indicates parallelism. The parallel structures are "were hidden" and "were discovered." Both apply to the previous construction "AF and her family who" - "who were hidden" and "who were discovered."

[kerlium78]

Good question - but, no, the verb "were" cannot take any subject. To match the subject, we have to take a look at the construction of the rest of the sentence.

"by a gentile Dutch couple" is a prepositional phrases. Prepositional phrases cannot contain the main subjects of sentences, so the "couple" is not a candidate to match with the verb "were."

Thanks a lot Stacey. I highly appreciate your response. You comprehensively cleared my concepts :)

However, i need to confirm one more thing. if we again look at the original sentence:

The Diary of Anne Frank tells the true story of a young girl and her family that were hidden during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands by a gentile Dutch couple, though they were eventually discovered.

Can we say that the pronoun "they" in the above sentence is not ambiguous? As you explained above, "by a gentile dutch couple" is a prepositional phrase, which cannot contain the main subject of the sentence.

So "they" unambiguously refers to "a young girl and her family". I want to confirm this because according to the solution "they" is ambiguous (as it can refer to the couple or to the family)

[mschwrtz]

The general rule is that when the pronoun and its antecedent appear in separate clauses, a subject pronoun takes a subject antecedent, and an object pronoun takes an object antecedent. It's no great trick to generate exceptions, but that's the general rule. If the rule fits the apparent sense of the sentence, then so much the better. I wouldn't characterize the "they" in A as ambiguous.