Grammar - 13-15 Vague Pronouns
- Details
- Category: English Language Arts
- Published: Thursday, 01 January 2015 11:30
- Written by Brian Jaeger
- Hits: 1974
ACT 13-15 range vague pronoun practice
I can revise vague pronouns
If the reader can’t tell which word(s) a pronoun refers to (the antecedent), that makes a vague pronoun reference. Pronouns stand in for nouns. What a pronoun replaces has to be easy for the reader to see. Pronouns also establish the point of view of the narrator. Let’s make a list of common pronouns and possible antecedents.
Example: It
It can refer to a myriad of possibilities…
The lunchroom smells like peanut butter. It is also obnoxiously loud.
An antecedent means a word has to come before the pronoun, like how your ancestors came before you.
Ancestors are your family members who came before you.
Antecedents are the words that come before the pronoun.
If you use the word he, she or it, the reader needs to know what or who you are referring to. Let’s look at an example by Roald Dahl and circle the pronouns.
Narrator
The sweet-shop in Llandaff in the year 1923 was the very center of our lives. To us, it was what a bar is to a drunk, or a church to a bishop. Without it, there would have been little to live for. But it had one terrible drawback, this sweet-shop. The woman who owned it was a horror. We hated her and had good reason for doing so.
Now let’s go back and draw arrows to the words that the pronouns refer to ( the antecedents).
When a pronoun drifts away from its antecedent, the entire meaning gets lost at sea.
Example: The ladies of the church have cast off clothing of every kind, and they can be seen in the church basement Friday afternoon.
Where is the mistake? How does the meaning get lost because of the vague pronoun?
Small Groups - Using the student passage below:
- Highlight the pronouns
- Find their antecedents
- What mistakes did this student make?
- How can she fix it?
We ate at McDonald’s for breakfast, it was delicious. I got a breakfast biscuit, hash browns, and orange juice. It looked beautiful, it had a picture that had dolphins and sharks and fish. It was really nice inside of McDonalds.
- Rewrite the paragraph above with clear pronouns.
- Circle the pronouns and draw lines back to the antecedents.
Let’s finish looking at Dahl’s writing. We did the first paragraph together. Finish the second paragraph with your group by circling the pronouns and drawing arrows back to their antecedents.
Narrator
The sweet-shop in Llandaff in the year 1923 was the very center of our lives. To us, it was what a bar is to a drunk, or a church to a bishop. Without it, there would have been little to live for. But it had one terrible drawback, this sweet-shop. The woman who owned it was a horror. We hated her and had good reason for doing so.
Her name was Mrs. Pratchett. She was a small, skinny old hag with a mustache on her upper lip and a mouth as sour as a gooseberry. She never smiled. She never welcomed us when we went in, and the only times she spoke when she had said things like, “I’m watching you so keep your thievin’ fingers off them chocolates!” Or “I don’t want you in ‘ere just to look around! Either you forks out or you gets out!”
Another example: