Adjective Clause dinamakan juga RELATIVE PRONOUN atau RELATIVE CLAUSE yaitu Clause (anak kalimat) yang digunakan/berfungsi sebagai adjective yang menerangkan keadaan noun atau pronoun.
Untuk lebih jelasnya penjelasan mengenai Adjective Clause, perhatikan penjelasan di bawah ini:
Contoh:
- I have read the book (that) you just mentioned.Main Clause: I have read the book.Subordinate Clause: (that) you just mentioned.
Anak kalimat menerangkan kata benda the book, disebut dengan Adjective Clause
- The lesson (that) she is learning is very difficult.Main Clause: The lesson is very difficult.Subordinate Clause: (that) she is learning.
Berdasarkan pada the Antecedent yang ditunjuk oleh introductory words (kata-kata pendahulunya), Adjective Clause dapat diklasifikasikan menjadi 2 macam, yaitu:
1. Relative Pronoun (Kata Ganti Orang)
Kata Penghubung yang digunakan adalah : Who, Whom, Whose, That
Who: used for humans in subject position (Subjek):
Examples :
-Hans, who is an architect, lives in Berlin
- He paid the money to the man who / that had done the work
Whom: used for humans in object position (Objek kata kerja dan objek kata depan):
Examples :
-Marike, whom Hans knows well, is an interior decorator.
- He paid the man whom/that he had hired. (Objek kata kerja)
- He paid the man from whom he had borrowed the money. (objek kata depan)
Whose: used for humans, animalsi or objects to give information about their possessions (Kata Ganti Kepunyaan).
Examples :
- The girl whose dress is red is my best friend.
- This is the girl whose picture you saw.
2. Relative Pronoun (Kata Ganti Benda, Binatang)
Kata Penghubung yang digunakan adalah: Which, that
That: used for humans, animals and things, in subject or object position (Subjek) but see below:
Examples:
- Marike is decorating a house that Hans designed.
- Here is a book that describes animals.
Which: used for things and animals in subject or object position (objek kata kerja dan kata depan) :
Examples :
- Marike has a dog which follows her everywhere.
- The chair which he broke is being repaired. (objek kata kerja)
- She was wearing the coat for which she had paid $2,00. (objek kata depan).
3. Relative Adverbs
When: used for time (Kata Penghubung yang digunakan untuk menerangkan waktu)
Examples :
-My baby was born in the year when I moved to Italy.
- This is the year whenthe Olympic Games are held.
Where: used for places (Kata Penghubung yang digunakan untuk tempat)
Examples :
- The hotel where we stayed last summer was very beautiful.
Noun clauses: Noun clauses can do anything that nouns can do. They take the place of nouns in other clauses or phrases and can be used just as a noun is used (subject, direct object, object of preposition, object of verbal phrase, appositive, etc.) Noun clauses are preceded by a relative pronoun (that, the fact that, which, whichever, who, whoever, whom, whomever, whose, and of which), or by a subordinating conjunction (that, whether). These clauses tell who/whom? or what?.
- Richard hopes that the new Harry Potter book will be published soon. (Noun clause as a direct object)
- Whoever glued my computer mouse to the table has to confess. (Noun clause as a subject)
- Roberta thought that her banker was an alien from another planet. (Noun clause as a direct object)
- Daisy Mae didn't care for the way Georgians cooked potatoes. (Noun clause as an object of the preposition)
- Hoping that Mark would call, Greta waited for hours. (Direct object of a participial phrase)
- Jack, who was the best candidate for the job, was made vice-president. (Noun clause as an appositive)
- Oscar's greatest fear is that his gorgeous curly hair will fall out. (Noun clause as a subject complement)
When you can recognize what a noun clause is, the next step is to decide if it improves the flow of the sentence, or not. Can it be changed to a noun or to some type of phrase to make it sound better?
- The fact that the dinosaurs' ten-year courtship ritual had to be completed before mating might have been the reason for their eventual extinction.
- Better: The lengthy, complicated courtship rituals of dinosaurs might explain why they are extinct. (Noun clause changed to adjectives and a noun and now acts as the subject of the sentence.)
- Better: By following time-consuming courting rituals, the dinosaurs ensured their own extinction. (Noun clause changed to a participial phrase.)
