List of interrogative pronouns
Interrogative pronouns
English has five interrogative pronouns: who, whom, whose, what, and which.
| Interrogative pronouns | ||
| Pronoun | Asking for / about | Example |
| What? | information, type | What’s your name? What is an oak – a tree or a plant? |
| Which? | choice | We have fruit tea and green tea – which would you like? |
| Who? | a person, a name | Who wrote War and Peace – was it Tolstoy? |
| Whose? | possession, owner | Whose is this pen? Is it yours? |
| Whom? (formal) | a person, name | Whom did you see? (formal, less common) Who did you see? (more common) |
Whom or who?
Whom is formal and is not used very often in spoken British English. It is, however, common in American English:
- Whom did you ask? [formal written, formal spoken British English]
- Who did you ask? [standard spoken British English]
Anonymous - February 3, 2016, 10:37 pm
When?
Stuart Cook - February 5, 2016, 10:16 pm
When is an adverb or conjunction.
Tasma Charles - January 17, 2017, 5:53 am
It depends on the sentence in which it is used. Consider its use in the examples below.
I do not know when to come.
I arrived when it was raining.
The students were eating when thunder struck.
Rihan - June 12, 2017, 4:02 pm
I like this speakspeak so much
Julie - October 1, 2017, 11:12 pm
Well, regarding who and whom, it has nothing to do with formal and informal speech. A simple test to see which one to use: Try to replace who or whom with a name. To use the examples above:
‘Whom did you ask?’ is correct. If you turn it into a sentence, you can not replace the word whom with a name. (Joey did you ask.) If you put a comma after Joey then it seems like it works. ‘Joey, did you ask?’ but that is still a question. You have to turn it into a sentence.
Who is going to the park? is correct. When you turn it into a sentence, you can replace who with a name: Joey is going to the park.
This is just a quick test I do but there is grammar logic behind who and whom. Object vs. Subject.
Reena - October 15, 2020, 2:17 pm
Where is my book? Isn’t this a pronouns?
uhane - April 9, 2022, 1:18 am
who refers to the object
whom refers to the subject
“to whom it may concern”
“who does it concern?”
not formal!