Can you reduce a non-restrictive relative clause?

Yes, I know that’s a question which has been keeping you up at night, but head on over to Cambridge’s Grammar and Beyond blog for my attempt at answering it. I’m not entirely sure I’ve got it quite right yet. While you’re there, you can play my new favorite game: find the sentence that faintly suggests the cover photo for the blog post!

My other recent posts there have been on there is/are and this/that/these/those, and they are equally riveting.

Author: Nigel Caplan

Nigel Caplan, Ph.D., is an associate professor at the University of Delaware English Language Institution, as well as a textbook author, consultant, and speaker. Nigel holds a PhD from the University of Delaware, a master's in TESOL from the University of Pennsylvania, and a bachelor's degree from Cambridge University. He is currently director of Project DELITE, a federal grant providing ESL certification to Delaware teachers. He also brews beer.

2 thoughts on “Can you reduce a non-restrictive relative clause?”

  1. I suppose you could if the antecedent was a clause:

    Max arrived late, which caused some delay. (Full)
    Max arrived late, causing some delay. (Reduced)

    Is that what you meant?

    1. Yes, that’s definitely a reduced non-restrictive clause in my book. If you head on over to the Cambridge blog link in my post, you’ll see the problem — when the clause has a nominal rather than clausal antecedent, it’s more tricky.

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